Hot Cares provides support for five-year-old’s nutritional and speech therapy needs
Hot Care 102.7 FM helps put a smile on Esmi Boucher’s parents’ faces when it offers to pay for the girl’s speech therapy.
Hot Cares recently offered to pay R3 000 towards Esmi’s Dis-Chem account for six months and R6 000 for her speech therapy sessions.
Hot Cares radio saw the need to step up and support the five-year-old from Alberton after her father, Michael Boucher, was nominated by one of his student’s parents for the Hot Care benefits on Hot 102.7 radio.
Esmi lives with cerebral palsy (CP) after she was born prematurely in 2019.
She had to stay in the neonatal ICU for 101 days under doctors’ supervision so they could ensure she was well cared for because she needed to grow stronger and get healthy.
According to Michael, while in the ICU, doctors diagnosed Esmi with cataracts in both eyes, and she needed to undergo eye lens surgery. However, because her parents were uncomfortable with it, and let it go.
Early last February, Esmi was diagnosed with CP, which affects her body movement and posture due to abnormal brain development caused by the disorder.
“Esmi developed brain damage due to the cataracts in her eyes, and the cataracts encouraged the cerebral palsy issues we’re currently sitting with,” said Michael.
This is a big challenge to Esmi and her parents because CP has affected the girl’s speech, and now, she requires speech therapy that the parents can’t afford.
In all this, Esmi has proved to be strong because she can live each day happily and continues to overcome her medical condition’s challenges.
“Thank you to Hot 102.7 for reaching out and caring for Esmi. We never knew some people cared for her. We thought we were alone,” said Michael.
