Help Isabelle find her voice

Isabelle is our daughter, born 7 years ago on 2/9/2015, here in Waterford City.

Isabelle is autistic & non-verbal. She is beautiful, she is bright but she has very special needs, which, increasing in complexity on a daily basis, have now brought us to breaking point,

as we find ourselves, still - fully 7 years later, trying to meet those needs –

on our own - without any assistance or even support from our country’s

Dept of Health.

As we write this GoFundME, we have in the past two months alone, spoken on three occasions to three different people from the Children’s Disability Network Team in Waterford City, all of whom were very sympathetic to both our and Isabelle’s plight but all of whom equally told us – without exception – that they are understaffed, that there is nothing they can do and that furthermore - they have no services available.

We were also advised that in order to get help we “need to go public” –

Accordingly, you can listen to our radio interview on the WLRFM website

(aired Thursday Sept 1st on the Deise Today programme – Part 1)

or read our newspaper article by Darren Skelton / Joe Evans

( Waterford News and Star - Tuesday August 30th).

Since 2019, we have endured an endless and infinite stream of rejection despite being tax paying, law abiding citizens of this island and now full time carers for Isabelle - of whom our Constitution declares that it will –

“protect and cherish her” as a child of the nation.

Like other autistic people – but mainly girls – Isabelle often engages in ‘masking’, which is the act of camouflaging or masking her autistic traits.

This often happens whenever she is outside of the family setting, as a trauma response and this manifests as repercussions almost immediately as she returns home – whereby, she will bang herself into furniture or bang her own head off her bedroom wall or try and throw herself down the stairs.

Sometimes she’ll just shut down and sit in her room, in the dark, only allowing her Mam to be with her, stiffening up her entire body and hitting herself, while we try give her massages to regulate her.

This is only one example of Isabelle’s daily issues.

Because of this – and our NON-EXISTENT health system, we are fighting to get the therapies and aids that our daughter needs.

We are aiming to raise funds to purchase The NovaChat 12 communication device.

The NovaChat 12 has a 12.2 inch LCD display and is the largest in the Chat line of products. It is a speech-generating device that offers the well-known Chat software on an Android platform. A variety of vocabulary configurations allows the device to be tailored to meet a person’s needs. The NovaChat includes thousands of SymbolStix symbols, and PCS symbols can be added.

The ability to use your own photos permits even further customization.

Isabelle now needs this device to give her the right tools and means of trying to communicate her basic needs and wants and also to facilitate her in expressing herself when she is feeling a particular emotion.

This device will help her cope and regulate herself more.

We want to make it clear that ALL DONATIONS will go towards this communication device and should there be any surplus funding attracted,

it will be donated to help another family that are struggling with similar issues.

On Sunday the 16th of October at 11am, David will cycle from the

Bilberry entrance on the Waterford Greenway to The Suir Valley Railway at Kilmeaden and will then continue on foot ie walk from there to

The Coach House in Kilmacthomas Co. Waterford.

We would like to invite you all to join us on this journey (feel free to join at any point on the Greenway or meet us at The Coach House itself, where you can buy refreshments and enjoy some musical entertainment which will be provided by some of our friends and colleagues.

All we would ask to do is share our gofundme link in as many areas and on as many platforms as possible and hopefully people will donate.

“When evening falls and the air gets colder

When shadows cover the road I am following

Will I be alone there in the darkness?

No, not alone, not alone

And I’ll never be…..

Never alone, you are walking

You’re walking with me”.

Yours So Thankfully

Christine & David Hennessy