Challengers relies on voluntary donations to help children like Brandon, his mum, Andrea Thomas, tells us why Challengers is so important for her and the rest of the family

"Our family initially started to come to Disability Challengers when our son Brandon was just 4 years old. Our family had recently entered a particularly chaotic phase. Brandon had just been diagnosed with autism, and our twin daughters, Lauren and Eloise had just been born. In addition, we had a very lively but demanding 2 year old, called Isabel. 

In a nut-shell, we had 4 children under the age of 4, including one with severe autism, and newborn twins!! With no family within 250 miles, we had plenty of challenges ahead.

Well let me tell you more about Brandon (now nearly 7). Brandon is an adorable, lively cuddly boy, but he is profoundly autistic. He has virtually no expressive language, low levels of receptive language, and very poor social understanding. He has significantly regressed with his toileting skills and has low self-help skills. He has very little understanding of danger, and will wander in front of cars, or wander away from parents and other carers. 

Brandon is a very physically enabled child. With endless amounts of energy, he runs fast, climbs, cycles, paints, completes jigsaws and like any other child wants to play and have fun. Here lies the problem. Brandon has a very strong own agenda; and due to his challenging behaviour, he cannot access many of the play-schemes and activities that most children take for granted. During school holidays, my daughter, Isabel can go ice-skating, do gymnastics, go to friends’ houses, trampolining, numerous play-schemes; endless choices of activities. For Brandon, these choices do not exist. There is only one place for Brandon- that is Disability Challengers. Challengers is a life-line for Brandon, and the family as a whole. We are absolutely dependent on Challengers, and without the holiday play-schemes, I would have completely cracked up by now.

I have so many positive things to say about Challengers, that I find it difficult to know where to start. Brandon currently attends the Guildford Play-scheme on Tuesdays and Thursdays of the School Holidays.   As I have previously alluded to, the benefits to our family are huge. Brandon has lots of fun, burns off lots of energy, and comes home tired and fulfilled. My daughters and I enjoy ourselves because we can do normal family activities like soft-play, friends houses, parks, shopping, etc; and my husband comes home to a less grumpy wife!! Brandon recently went to an additional session at Farnham during Half-term. I had a great day with my girls. Isabel commented that it was the best day she had had in a long time. Challengers provides invaluable respite to our family, in addition to the huge amounts of pleasure that it gives to Brandon.

Brandon also goes to Challengers after-school club. This means that I can take Isabel and the twins to gymnastics. Without this service, Isabel would not be able to do gymnastics, as I could not take Brandon due to his difficult behaviour.

Brandon goes to Saturday play-schemes once a fortnight. Again, he gets to play, and the rest of the family get to do typical family things. This coming Saturday, Brandon is having his first sleep-over at Challengers. My husband and I are taking the three girls to see the Cinderella pantomime. Again, this has been made possible by Challengers.

Finally, I wanted to say a few words about the staff. I cannot put into words how much I appreciate the enthusiasm and care shown by the play-team towards Brandon. When you have an autistic child you get so many negative comments and looks from people because so much of autism is about behaviour. It really makes my day, when I collect Brandon from Challengers, and the staff express to me their affections for him. That is priceless! I still feel completely indebted to Sam, Hannah and the rest of the team for their help earlier this year in our week of snow. Brandon’s school closed for the whole week, and we were all snowed in and climbing the walls. Sam phoned me to see if she could collect Brandon in the bus, along with the other local disabled children to take them out and then back to Challengers for a play. I was very touched by this. Usually when you have a disabled child, everything is a fight. When someone contacts you offering to help its wonderful!"

Please support more families and children like Brandon by donating online today.  For more stories and snapshots of Disability Challengers look at our latest pictures from the Spring holidays, newsletters and gallery pages