Help make Zayn's dream come true

Zayn is nine years old and is a lovely, happy and very special little boy. He has his own unique personality and brings so much joy to our family. He particularly enjoys swimming,and he really loves playing on his iPad. These are things that bring him happiness and are also lovely ways for him to engage with the world around him, he also learning to ride his bike.

Zayn is autistic, and one of his biggest challenges is communication. At 9 years old, he is still not able to fully communicate verbally in the way that other children his age can. He can find it very difficult to express what he wants to express what kinda of day he had , how he is feeling or when something is wrong.

As you can understand this can be incredibly frustrating for him and us as well.

Communication can also make social interaction difficult for Zayn. Everyday things that many children naturally develop, such as having conversations, asking questions, explaining how they feel or telling someone what they need, can be much harder for him.

Speech and language therapy with Rachel has been extremely beneficial to Zayn. Over the past year, we have seen positive changes in his communication and his ability to engage with the people around him. Rachel understands Zayn, works with him at his own pace and has helped him develop skills that are appropriate for his individual needs.

Seeing Zayn make progress through his therapy has been incredibly important to us. It has shown us that, with the right support, he is capable of developing and learning new ways to communicate. Zayn over the past year has learned to communicate his basic life needs such us "I want to drink", "I want to eat" and "Use toilet". We want to continue building on the progress he has already made rather than risk him losing out on opportunities to develop further.

The therapy sessions are costly, particularly because they need to be ongoing, but I genuinely believe that without this support Zayn would be at a disadvantage. He already faces challenges with communication that other children his age don’t have to deal with, and having access to specialist speech and language therapy gives him a much better opportunity to communicate, become more independent and reach his potential.

The cost of the session is £77.00 for one hour and he has a session every fortnight.

Our hope is that, with continued therapy, Zayn can keep developing his communication skills and confidence. We want him to be able to express his needs, his feelings and his personality as much as possible, and to have the best opportunities available to him as he grows older.

For us, this fundraising is about giving Zayn the support he needs to continue progressing. We don’t want the cost of therapy to become a barrier to something that is having such a positive impact on his life.

Every donation, no matter how big or small, would help us continue Zayn’s therapy and give him the opportunity to keep developing his communication skills. It would mean so much to us as a family to have the support of people who believe in giving Zayn the best possible chance for his future.

Thank you for taking the time to understand a little more about Zayn and why continuing his therapy is so important to us.

7.5% of all donations to Tree of Hope in relation to this appeal will be allocated to the general charitable purposes of Tree of Hope to cover our core operating costs.

If we raise insufficient funds, or surplus funds, they will be used, if appropriate, to fund support for our child’s needs in accordance with Tree of Hope’s charitable objectives. If, in those circumstances, we are unable to use all or part of the funds for the benefit of our child, any funds that cannot be used will be transferred to be used for the general charitable purposes of Tree of Hope.