After contracting Lyme disease and post-concussion syndrome, it was as if everything that he had learned to read had been erased.

We strongly recommend the Equipping Minds cognitive therapy program without any reservation.  Our son was diagnosed with progressed Lyme’s disease in December of 2016.  It was causing brain fog and an inability to focus.  He underwent a short round of antibiotic therapy with limited success.  After testing positive again to 5 strains of Lyme’s he underwent a 13-week course of 3 kinds of antibiotics.  It left him weak and nauseated and still positive to 3 strains of Lyme.  We had gotten a small trampoline to get him outside and put in the driveway, the only sunny place in our tiny city yard to get him more vit.D.  It was fine until one day in late April of 2017 that the kids forgot to zip the safety net and he flew through the zipper opening on a crazy jump and got a concussion and neck injury.

The emergency room staff assured us that he just needed to rest for a month or more but then would be fine.  When his headaches lessened and we went back to school work, he couldn’t remember any sight-words or phonics.  It was as if everything that he had learned to read had been erased.  That summer we also discovered while in the States that his eyes were not tracking together and still could not tolerate bright light.  He was still getting headaches and a cycle of headaches and unstoppable vomiting started, repeating every couple of weeks.  That fall we did vision therapy every day and started reteaching the alphabet.  By the spring of 2018, he could read a little, but it was laborious.  He tested positive for Lyme’s still but wasn’t well enough to do the antibiotics. We started looking for help but no doctor here had an answer or could offer any help for the headaches, vomiting, failure to read, failure to thrive.

In February of 2019, a friend recommended Equipping Minds for David and mentioned the series of lectures that Dr. Carol was giving.  I was convinced that this was the answer to the 2 years of torture for our son.  Dr. Carol replied immediately and got us started on a better diet and the primitive reflex exercises.  In the meantime, we ordered the games from the States and got David playing them for fun with his siblings.  Then in June, we were able to start meeting with Clayton, one of the Equipping Minds therapists on a weekly basis.  David responded very well to Clayton and the 2 years of frustration with cognitive tasks started to melt away. 

We were back in the States in the summer  (2019) and were able to get to an Atlas orthogonal chiropractor as Dr. Carol had recommended.  And she was right, his neck was jack-knifed.  Even the neurologist in Slovakia had said there was a nerve problem in his neck but didn’t know what to do to solve it.  So with several treatments, the neck was realigned releasing the nerves and the headaches diminished.

Per Dr. Carol’s recommendation, he was also able to get a follow-up on vision therapy which showed an improvement in tracking from 2 years previous, but a lack of peripheral vision.  He underwent a month of daily vision therapy with follow-up exercises to do throughout the school year.

During this time in July in the USA Clayton had an opening and David was added as a daily client.  He made much faster cognitive progress with the daily meetings and with taking care of the other physical issues.

When we returned to Slovakia David was able to continue to meet with Clayton during that time slot.  He made improvements in memory, processing speed, working memory, and comprehension.   In December he finally started gaining weight and got past the emaciated look. I noticed a big change in December when David was able to memorize “O Come All Ye Faithful” in Latin for the Christmas program.  And then in January, he was picking up books to read for fun. His processing speed continued to improve and he was able to “graduate” from the Equipping Minds program with an official therapist to continue a lighter program just with me.

We are deeply grateful for the scholarship that made this all possible.  Dr. Carol’s evaluation was key in getting all of David’s issues addressed.  The work with Clayton helped unlock David’s anger, which probably would not have happened if David had just worked with us as parents.