Children and Families

From its outset, the work of Keren Malki has been principally about children with special needs and the families who work so diligently to raise them in the warmth of their own home.

Several profiles are sketched out below. They describe special-needs and the families who have asked Keren Malki for assistance. (Names below are changed to protect the privacy of the children and their families.)

Keren Malki seeks to empower these families, and hundreds of others, to achieve more than they could without the support that Keren Malki provides.

Images of several of the children can be viewed at the extraordinary online exhibit of photographs taken by Nir Alon, an unusually skilful photographer from Jerusalem. Nir Alon's very special project, called Malki's Legacy, focuses on the children in their homes and undergoing therapy. We highly recommend you visit Nir's site.

(Profiles are updated and changed from time to time - please check back.)

Yoni was born in 2003, only a few minutes after his twin sister, Ayelet. After Yoni’s diagnosis, his parents took him to be tested, recognizing that he reached certain developmental milestones months after his sister did. Yoni was diagnosed with a Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD), a category including delays in the development of functions such as socialization and communication.

Until the age of three, Yoni did not speak at all. When he did begin to speak, only those closest to him could understand him due to his problems pronouncing words correctly. However, after working with speech therapists three times each week for years, today he is behind his peers by a matter of mere months and is able to make himself understood to everyone.

But the most impressive aspect of his success has been behavioral: Initially he was closed, passive, and sad, unengaged and unwilling to approach challenges. Thanks to Keren Malki’s assistance, his parents were able to offer him all opportunities possible while keeping him at home and making decisions about his schooling. They integrated him in a mainstream nursery (with an assistant accompanying him) and he underwent paramedical treatments in the afternoons.

Slowly he began to show interest in the children around him, learned to approach them, and, eventually, was able to stand up for himself. Due to his integration and concurrent treatments, he became energetic, happy, and even mischievous.

Now nearly five years old, Yoni is an intelligent and sociable child. He is no longer afflicted with PDD; in fact, medical and paramedical professionals who meet him are astonished to hear that he was every considered to be in that range. Due to his experiences with intensive therapy, he is now able to communicate and socialize with his peers and the future, for him, knows no bounds.

Ayelet, born a few minutes before her twin brother Yoni, developed on schedule until she was a year old. At that point, her progress began to slow down, and, at eighteen months, she began to regress. Her parents took her to be tested, and discovered that she had a wide range of disorders—physical, sensory, and social.

Today, at nearly five years of age, she works each day to overcome her disorders. Ayelet’s treatment includes meeting the following twice a week: an occupational therapist, hydrotherapist, physiotherapist, and speech therapist.

A trained professional advises, coordinates, and supervises the work of four assistants who are with Ayelet for seven and a half hours each day, helping her focus and refine motor skills. Ayelet is even beginning to work on reading and mathematics.

Without the assistance made possible by Keren Malki, Ayelet may have withdrawn permanently in order to avoid a world which is too painful; she would never have learned to speak; she would have spent her time entirely isolated.

Diagnosed with cerebral palsy at the age of eleven months, Maayan’s parents found themselves spending upwards of a thousand shekels each month on paramedical therapies. Coupled with the cost of travel to the city and babysitters, it was more than the family could handle.

They looked for support and were delighted to learn of Keren Malki’s Right to Nurture program, which would heavily subsidize their paramedical treatments.

At the age of five and a half, Maayan underwent surgery on his legs and, in his mother’s words, he began to fly. Today, at age eight, he is in third grade in a regular school. He walks to school each day on his own using crutches, and puts them away when he arrives, running in the school hallways independently.

Just before going to press with the latest Keren Malki newsletter in August 2005, we received a letter of thanks from the parents of Shulamit, a beautiful child with cerebral palsy.

Shulamit's parents turned to Keren Malki's Right to Nurture program, to get support for their energetic efforts to give their daughter the best possible physiotherapy.

Attaching this picture (at left) of their child with her therapist, they wrote:

“Please use this photo with our permission. Our daughter’s smile is sent to you with joy and gratitude.”

[Our policy is never to breach the privacy of families who turn to Keren Malki, and never to show the faces or reveal the identities of the families or children we help without their express consent.]

Born three months premature, Noam was diagnosed with cerebral palsy after months in intensive care. His parents were told by doctors that he would never be mobile and quite possibly would be severely cognitively impaired; one social worker even recommended “homes” that he could be placed in.

Now, at the age of four, Noam is beginning to recognize letters and knows his numbers. He is working on learning to read. He walks with a walker and is able to stand and even take two steps independently; his speech and cognitive abilities are completely comparable to those of his peers. He continues to progress with the help of the paramedical professionals, in physiotherapy each day, hydrotherapy twice a week, and speech therapy once a week.

While he knows that every new skill will be a challenge, he is up to each new task; he sets his sights and, using the resources he is given, achieves his goals.

Hundreds of children from every part of Israeli society - Druze, Jewish, Muslim, Christian - are helped by the non-sectarian, non-political work of Keren Malki