Hello, My name is Christine Schwab. I'm a Childcare and Respite Care provider for children with special needs. I'm also a parent with a special needs child. I'm proud to serve on the board of Special Haven, a sensory room to benefit children with Autism and other special needs. Please attend our fundraiser event this Sunday December 4th. Read on for details about the event, as well as Special Haven.

Massage Marathon December 4 th to Benefit Special Haven

Multi Sensory Room to benefit Children and Adults with Special Needs

Join us Sunday December 4, 9am to 4 pm   at Intuitive Healing Center

213 G. Street Antioch, 94509

Drop in all day for relaxing chair massages, neck, back and shoulders, foot massages and foot soaks

Suggested donations:

30 minute neck, back and shoulders $20.

15 min. chair massage $10,

foot soak $5, with 5 minute foot massage $10.

(We recommend pre-booking appointments if 30 mins. By calling 925 777 9995)

It is our hope that anyone who would love to help our special needs community in East County will join us for a massage on December 4th to kick start our fundraising.

Besides the chance to get a massage while helping a charity there will also be the opportunity to shop for Christmas with various local vendors. A representative from Gold Refinery will also be on hand so if you have any broken gold/silver jewelry or an odd earring etc… please bring them along to the event to get some cash for yourself! All proceeds from massage and donations from our vendors will benefit Special Haven.

Please read on to find out more about Special Haven.

As many in our community already know, there is a new non profit in town, "Special Haven" (501C3 status pending). We are a passionate, new group striving to help children and adults with special needs in Antioch and our surrounding Communities by providing a purpose built Multi sensory room. It will be based at "Intuitive Healing Center Antioch" where many of the clients are children and adults with special needs seeking therapy through massage and reflexology.

Special Haven will be unique to the local community of Antioch and the surrounding towns. At this point, nothing even remotely similar exists. Our multi-sensory room will be for the benefit and development of children and adults of all ability levels, most of whom have extremely limited opportunity for both interaction with the world around them and socialization.

Special Haven will provide a multi-sensory environment for children and adults with special needs and the elderly as a creative outlet to express themselves with unlimited possibilities. It will be a dedicated room that attempts to block out noise, control space, temperature, and lighting. It is an artificially created venue that brings together multi-sensory equipment in one place to stimulate the senses. This venue promotes pleasure and or feelings of well-being and can be utilized as part of the learning or treatment experience or for leisure and relaxation. It is Controlled Sensory Input (CSI), especially designed to promote choice, interaction, and relationships through planned stimulation of the senses. It relieves stress, anxiety and pain. 

Multi Sensory Environments have been shown to help with autism, brain injury, challenging behaviors, dementia, developmental disabilities, mental illness, palliative care, pre and post surgery, special education and of course wellness. It aims to maximize a person’s potential to focus and then to act on this change through an adaptive response to their environment. In this way the individual will initiate and react in a meaningful, productive way at their ability to situations, things and people in their environment. An adaptive response is a dynamic and ever changing process. Simply put Multi-Sensory Environments help change behavior, increase focus and attention and add to the feelings of positive self-esteem and well-being. 

Special Haven will be run, for the most part, on a “By appointment” basis, and can be reserved at specific dates and times. Appointments will be available Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, between 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. As time allows, “drop-in” sessions will also be scheduled as "Fun Days" designed as an opportunity for young people to interact and share the space with others. During these times, a Special Haven volunteer who has been trained to use the equipment will supervise usage and activity. All Board members will be trained to use the equipment to its fullest purpose, and will be able to teach parents and guardians the proper intent and use of equipment, as well. Supervision must be provided by parents or guardians at all times, with the exception of Special Haven Fun Days. On these days, extra volunteers will be on hand to play games and help families use the equipment. We also expect to use the multi-sensory room to house other special events with local organizations such as KinderMusik and Creative Kids (a new organization providing after school activities for children and adults with special needs). With a significant number of special education classes and programs present in our local communities, it is our hope that the space will be used for school field trips as well.

Activities will be donated or funded by monies received through grants or private donations. Equipment for the multi-sensory room will be funded and maintained by private donations and grants as well as through profits made from fundraisers organized by volunteers.

The lives of these children and adults will be enhanced by the existence of Special Haven. Until now, they have been mostly dependent upon medically provided treatments and therapies, and are severely limited to those services that their medical carriers provide. Many miss out entirely on opportunities for interaction and growth due to the high costs generally associated with experiences seen as “alternative,” even if they are geared toward therapy and healing.

As you can see you have a huge task ahead of us with the estimated cost of the finished room being approximately $35,000, but we are a very passionate group of volunteers who are working hard to achieve our goal. 

We have approached and hope to work closely with The Christopher Douglas Hidden Angels Foundation who help non profit groups to start multi sensory rooms in Northern California. Here is a youtube link to one of their videos which nicely shows what we are striving to achieve and why:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCvtIIdQgYk

For more, please see our web page at http://www.intuitivehealingcenter.net/special_haven.html

 

 

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