Milo is a sweet, caring, and kind-hearted little guy who loves his family. He’s the kind of kid who lights up a room. 

Milo and his twin brother were born at 36 weeks by C-section and Milo required significant suctioning and respiratory support due to a complicated delivery. He eventually came home from the NICU to join his twin brother Henry, big sister Ava, and big brother Wes. We noticed right away that Milo’s body was very rigid and tight, and back arched often. He cried a lot, due to the pain of his tight muscles. He could not use his right arm when playing or eating. After an MRI and several doctor appointments he was diagnosed as High Risk for Cerebral Palsy. We were surprised by the diagnosis and wanted to help him the best we could right away. Milo began OT, PT, and speech through the Baby Stars program at the Perlman Center at Cincinnati Children’s.  Milo made so much progress- he learned to walk and use the right side of his body better, and we continued OT and PT at Children's and used the support of Help Me Grow specialists. We saw the benefits of recognizing his needs early and starting his therapy right away. 

Because cerebral palsy affects Milo’s nervous system, his body has a harder time processing the world around him, which can make his emotions feel bigger, faster, and harder to control.  It has an impact on his sleep and ultimately his emotional regulation.  Milo has frequent meltdowns over what many might consider small things: a simple misunderstanding of a question or statement he is making, the way his clothes fit, how tight or loose something is, the texture of a food. These are all examples of things that could send Milo over the edge emotionally.  Milo’s therapist best describes this as when he wakes up in the morning, his “emotional cup” is already full, whereas most of us wake up with an empty cup.  Milo mainly benefits from behavior disruption (distraction), deep pressure, and heavy work.  Many of which we discovered can be provided by a service dog.  

There are active and passive behavior disruption tasks the service dog can do to benefit their partner! They can actively disrupt a repetitive behavior that indicates they are overwhelmed, anxious, etc by coming over and bumping their partner with their nose until their focus breaks on that act. They can passively assist in moments of dysregulation by providing a weighted, grounded sensory experience through deep pressure therapy. The service dog can also jump in and help distract their partner during meltdowns by doing a "nuzzle" and giving their kiddo kisses.

Our need to fulfill this dream for Milo is to raise $23,000 to fund our part of a service dog for him. We are so appreciative of any donations or shares. Thank you for helping Milo. 

Training a service dog to meet our child’s requirements can be very costly. On average it costs between $40,000-60,000 to raise, train, and place a service dog at 4 Paws for Ability. While 4 Paws for Ability fundraises to help cover a significant portion of this cost, families are tasked with raising $20,000 of that amount or $23,000 if receiving a poodle, doodle or papillon. We hope that we can receive assistance from our beloved family and friends to help make our service dog dream a reality.