Alia's Story / George Jeffrey Children's Foundation / Thunder Bay, Ontario

Alia's Story

March 10, 2020

Alia was 30 months old when she was diagnosed with autism. After learning this our family had many questions including "What does this mean for Alia?" and "How can we help her?" We wanted to make sure Alia still had every opportunity to live her best life.

In the beginning Alia was referred for an Early Intervention Program at another organization. However, a Resource Teacher at a City day care saw opportunities for Alia to benefit from George Jeffrey Children's Centre's Feeding Clinic and Fine and Gross Motor Clinic. We received a referral and that's when our journey began with George Jeffrey.

The clinicians at George Jeffrey continue to go above and beyond to help our family. They have helped identify additional therapeutic services Alia is now benefiting from including Speech-Language Therapy, Occupational Therapy, Physiotherapy, and Social Work.

The clinicians at George Jeffrey are passionate and have helped our family navigate the care system with ease. They continue to make sure we have all the information and services needed for Alia to receive the best care.

Alia has made some incredible achievements to date ranging from increased communication, improved self-regulation, and even trying almost all foods! Alia enjoys her visits to George Jeffrey with the Snoezelen Room (the Centre's controlled multi-sensory environment) being her favourite!

Looking to the future, the plan is for Alia to communicate effectively by speaking or through an assistive device with the help of the Augmentative and Alternative Communication team. We also will continue to work with the teams at George Jeffrey to help Alia do regular day-to-day tasks independently.

Our family wants the donors and supporters of George Jeffrey to know that their generosity is helping the clinicians and staff go above and beyond when it comes to helping families like ours. We don't know what we would have done without George Jeffrey Children's Centre!