A sensory garden for Lorelei Eve

Hello! My name is Kieron and I am the very proud father of the beautiful Lorelei Eve. She is 3 years old and was born on Christmas Eve 2019. She had her first real challenge in life within minutes of being born, as she was immediately moved to NICU and spent the first 10 days of her life in an incubator, mainly due to breathing issues.

As she has been growing up, we noticed that she was a little slow with things such as lifting her head, learning to crawl, and learning to walk etc, compared to family members around the same age. The main concern however was the fact that she was not starting to use words at all.

She is now around 3 1/2 years old and is still totally nonverbal. She has been diagnosed with autism, which comes with a whole load of challenges, every day is different with each one bringing different difficulties and surprises in terms of what Lorelei does. She finds it hard to communicate what it is she wants or needs at any given time, which can really frustrate her.

The reason I am starting a fundraiser for her is she has extreme anxiety about going in the car, or into shops/anywhere new. The furthest she will go is just for a walk around our small estate. We are currently in the process of receiving support to aid her with trying to overcome these fears, but due to the effect of the pandemic, the waiting list to be seen for this is extremely long. So I thought if we cannot take her out to nice parks and different places, then I would try to bring some of that to her.

We would absolutely love your help with raising some funds to create a sensory garden for Lorelei, a place where she can feel safe and enjoy herself without the pressure of loud noises, a place where she can play with sensory toys and water which are her favourite things. But most importantly, a place where she can be herself without any judgement from the outside world.

I have tried reaching out to various garden centres and other places that I thought may be able to assist us with this, but have had no luck, and with the summer fast approaching, I would love to be able to put something in place to allow her to enjoy the warm weather which she previously has been unable to do. Lorelei is a very sensory-driven child, and we have purchased different toys over the last few months which are based on lights, texture and colour which she has enjoyed playing with, but we are desperate for her to start spending more time outside, and we are hoping that if she has a reason to spend more time in the garden, she may start to build some confidence when it comes to taking her to other places.

With your help, our dream could become a reality. Any donation big or small could make such a huge difference.

Thank you for taking the time to read our story.

Kieron x