Our Joyful 💎
Allow me the pleasure of introducing you to our amazing, gorgeous, joyful 💎.
In 2020 we walked into his foster parent’s home and he walked into our hearts. Instantly, we knew he was ours, we were head over heels in love with this beautiful boy with a wobbly walk. We spent a week getting to know him; visiting him, showing him what would be his new forever home and then he moved in.
When he first came to us, at the age of 20 months, he had very poor muscle strength, lacked eye contact, had no words and made hardly any sound at all. He struggled to walk and couldn’t walk in shoes.
But… he had the most joyful spirit, contagious laugh, amazing determination and a warm heart.
This is still the case today…
In June 2021 we were blessed with our joyful 💎 officially and legally becoming our son, taking on our name, making us the Jenkins’ 3! He is the greatest gift God has blessed us with and he makes every day great by simply being unapologetically him.
💎 has developmental delays and his paediatrician is adamant he’s autistic, so we are journeying all that through with him currently. But rather than seeing it as a stressful journey and getting bogged down in what he should be doing at his age, according to the tick boxes of society, we simply enjoy watching him learn, grow and explore in his own way. I love nothing more than entering my 💎’s world rather than expecting him to step into what society deems normal.
💎 has changed how I look at the world around me and has taught me to slow down.
I remember our first trip to the zoo, he spent the first half of the day crying and couldn’t explain to us why or how he was feeling. But eventually he calmed and found great fun; not looking at the animals but playing with bark, looking at each bit in great detail and looking at all the notice boards, especially the one about giraffes. On our second trip to the zoo, we sat him in his pram and placed a bunch of bark in his lap for him to play with until he was ready to get out of his pram and play. That day he had great fun playing with daisy’s!
🙌🏻👊🏻 That’s what we call a ‘smashing life’ sort of day!
On a trip to the Botanical Gardens of Wales, he spent 15 minutes looking at one flower; this one flower had a bent petal on it that caught his attention, obviously it required further study. Patience was never a great character trait of mine until our 💎 walked into my life 😂.
💎 loves his family, he will actually move us around and make sure we are all in the same room. One set of grandparents visited the other week and when his Taid went to leave the room 💎 ran after him, took him by the hand and made him sit back down on the sofa. Then did his happy dance with his mission accomplished. It was unfortunate timing for Taid as he really wanted to go to the loo 😂 but 💎 wanted his family together.
He still has no words, but…
He can run and climb, he has really good eye contact with those whom he trusts, he can line his numbers up from 0 to 10 and his alphabet from A to N. He has recently learnt to clap and to play ‘Boo’. He has lots of different sounds; short ones, long ones, quiet ones and very very very loud ones! You still catch him exploring the trees, hedges and flowers in a zoo or playground and having the best time doing so. He loves musical instruments, playing ball, throwing sand and most of all he enjoys having those he loves and who love him together in one place.
We are penned in love and so are you!
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