12/07/2025
Gideon, my sweet sweet boy, you truly are a miracle and a beautiful gift from God. A new and exciting opportunity that we are so thankful to experience. Gideon's speech therapist has put us in touch with a company that provides eye gaze devices to help people communicate. We are currently on a 2 week trial and when I tell you I am AMAZED by this boy, it doesn't even scratch the surface of just how truly remarkable he is!
To give a little rundown of how the device works, there is a setting that calibrates to his eyes as he looks around the screen. Once it syncs up it follows his eyes as he moves around the screen. He has different apps that he can open by focusing and the eye gaze will open the app. There are words he can 'click' on with his gaze and the machine will speak them. There are also games with animals, musical instruments and animated color pages.
Yesterday we set it up while at speech therapy. Gideon wasn't interested at first but we needed him to wake up in order to sync it up to his eyes. I took his blanket off of him and got him out of his chair to dance around to get him ready to play. Once he was feeling active I put him in his chair and we were able to get the eye gaze calibrated we watched as Gideon explored the app and the different words. He seemed to catch on very quickly as his eyes kept 'clicking' on words and we could hear the machine speaking. He kept going back and forth between "want" and "what?" So I asked him, "Gideon, do you want something? What do you want?" We could see his eyes traveling across the screen as he seemed to be examining the words. He finally came across the word "blanket" and when machine spoke it Gideon's demeanor changed and immediately the eye gaze went back and forth speaking, "Want, Blanket, Want Blanket, Want Blanket." I was enjoying watching him explore and then it clicked HE WAS SPEAKING!! He was requesting HIS blanket, the one I took off of him to help wake him up! I picked up his blanket and asked, "Gideon, are you telling me you want your blanket?" Again the machine "Want, Blanket." I said I am sorry buddy here is your blanket back and placed the blanket on his lap and tucked it at his sides. He squealed with delight and started kicking his legs in excitement!
I looked at his speech therapist and said "I am not crazy, right? That wasn't a coincidence right? He just successfully communicated a want for essentially for the first time right!?!" Still in disbelief I broke down bawling! I can't even begin to describe what I was feeling!
His speech therapist had tears running down her face and said, "Gideon, I am so proud of you for finding your voice! Thank you for telling us you wanted your blanket!"
I was a mess, a happy stunned mess, completely in awe for the next several minutes as Gideon continued to "speak" to us through his eyes gaze. The words that followed were, night-light, tuck in, lights off, goodnight, repeatedly!🤣 He was apparently ready to continue napping!
I am extremely thankful for technology that allows Gideon to have a voice! I am so proud of how hard he works to adapt to the world around him! I am looking forward to continuing to trial this device and hopefully be able to get him one to use permanently!
"On the glorious splendor of your majesty, and on your wondrous works, I will meditate.They shall speak of the might of your awesome deeds, and I will declare your greatness,They shall pour forth the fame of your abundant goodness and shall sing aloud of your righteousness." Psalms 145 5-7
