WHEN 11-year-old Luke Wyburn was diagnosed with serious hearing impairment his parents were lost. But the Shepherd Centre soon came to their aid.
"It sounds corny but the Shepherd Centre gave us life changing support," Roslyn Wyburn said.
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"When your child is first diagnosed you're thrown into a world you know nothing about."
At that stage Luke, 18 months, was fitted with hearing aids and the family of five had bumped from one specialist office to the next, still without much comprehension of what it all meant.
His diagnosis was moderate bilateral sensorineural hearing loss, which they would soon learn, meant a long road to give him requisite language skills.
Like 90 per cent of families they had no history of hearing impairment and were clueless.
But the Sydney-based Shepherd Centre holds regional outreach workshops to give families the information and support they need.
Roslyn and Mark, along with the three children, were put up for a week at Sydney so they could attend.
Special guests spoke about everything from hearing aids to what parents could do at home to help their child.
It came about when Dr Bruce Shepherd's two children were born hearing impaired and he developed methods to help them and other children speak.
"That's why the Shepherd Centre is so fantastic because they've lived it," Mrs Wyburn said.
"It gave us hope for the future and we learnt more in that week than in a whole year.
"Hearing aids are not like glasses, children with hearing aids require extensive therapy to help them speak."
Luke now attends Kotara South Public School.
And while he's in a special class, he interacts with the rest of the school in the playground, in plays and at sport.
"On the upside he's a very happy boy and he can communicate with us quite well," Mrs Wyburn said.
"He can be a real chatterbox - sometimes we have to tell him to be quiet."
The Shepherd Centre has just launched its 2016 tax appeal.
It is a campaign that urges Australians to remember the needs of deaf and hearing impaired children when planning their end of financial year donations.
The campaign aims to raise $300,000 to help provide support services for families in rural and remote areas.
To find out more about the tax appeal or to donate to this cause, log on and visit www.shepherdcentre.org.au
