Help Lukey pay for crucial ABA Autism Therapy

Our dear family and friends,

We need urgent help for our son with autism, so he can continue his therapies and his development.

We’ve been hit with a high $19,000 ABA (Applied Behavioral Analysis) therapy bill, not knowing that therapies weren’t actually being paid by the insurance we had to use. Lukey's life has been positively changed by ABA, and he's no longer allowed to receive the help he needs until we pay his service provider. ABA is a life changing therapy that gives our boy a strong chance at a successful future in the world. We are asking for any help you can offer to help him get back into ABA.

ABOUT LUKEY:

Our wonderful boy is 7 years old and has severe, non-verbal autism with developmental delays, something he was diagnosed with at age 3. 

Lukey is THE most loving, sweet, happy boy with a gentle soul. He loves jumping on his trampoline, swinging and playing for hours and hours in water. Mr. “Cookie” is a chicken nugget and candy fiend, and tries so hard to verbally ask for his favorite things, which makes us have high hopes for the future. He has a 9 year old neuro-typical sister, who he loves to the end of the world and back. :-)

Lukey’s smile is otherworldly and he brings joy to everyone around him. From a distance, he looks just like any other child, but this precious little man isn’t like other kids, and his childhood is anything but typical. 

He goes to a specialized school for children with autism. He’s worked harder than anyone I know, going to countless therapies for speech, occupational therapy, and most importantly ABA (Applied Behavioral Analysis) therapy. ABA is a therapy that focuses on behavior and learning. The overall goal of ABA is to figure out why a child behaves the way they do and then focuses on ways to encourage those good behavior habits, which essentially literally shapes a special kiddo’s life in irreplaceable ways. 

It’s important to know, especially considering Lukey‘s age, that the brain is most easily shaped within an individual’s first 7 or 8 years of life, making the power of learning incredibly greater in those first several years. However, you average cost of the person affected with autism in a lifetime is somewhere between 3 and $7 million. Autism affects 1 in 54 boys and the numbers are growing higher every day, with a child diagnosed every 20 minutes. 

OUR PLEA:

As we mentioned, we've been handed a $19,000 ABA therapy bill, not knowing that therapies weren’t actually being paid by the insurance we’d had to change to at that time.

We’ve put every possible penny towards his bill, but we still have to pay $10,000 by August 1st, absolute latest, in order for him to still be able to go to his specialized schooling and therapy. Our jobs only pay so much and the costs are insane. This comes after our state autism scholarship has already been applied, and we have tapped out all of our other resources.

His Medicaid coverage has refused to pay for his therapy bill because the state assigned us a plan at the time that did not cover ABA. We immediately tried to change to a plan that covered it, but were told we couldn't until 2 months had passed. This caused his ABA bill to continue to increase and added to our problems. 

As his parents, it’s hard to sleep, eat or function normally when this boy is crying for his therapy and we cannot provide it for him at the moment. We can see his need.

Lukey is trying to be fiercely independent, but doesn’t currently have the tools he so desperately needs to succeed. This is what his therapies would provide. We’ve never dreamed we would experience such difficulties, just to provide support for him and set him up for success later in life. We do not know what the future holds for our son with autism, the public school system hasn’t been able to provide him with what he so desperately needs. They just don't have the resources, and they can't give him the special care he needs. He has always defied the odds, and we just hope he can continue to do so in the future. 

Our current insurance should provide coverage in the future year, we hope, but we simply cannot move forward without catching up with what is asked of us. We’re at a standstill. Please consider helping this incredible blessing of a little boy, who’s trying to come out of his shell and succeed. 

Thank you to everyone who’s already helped us on this lifelong journey so far!!! Lukey can do it!

Much love from the entire Toms family, xoxo 

Here’s to never giving up hope!