Success Story: Josué Silvestre

The story of Josué Silvestre begins in Merida, where he was born on April 2014. His father met his mother in Huatulco, they got married and thereafter they moved to Yucatán, where their children Caleb and Josué were born. When he turned 8 months old, his family moved the community of Los Olivos, in the municipality of Santa María Huatulco and his father started working as a waiter in the tourist complex of Huatulco Bays.

When Josué was two years old, his mother realized that Josué didn’t hear. However, his diagnosis had to wait due to constant labor stoppage in the Popular Social Security (Seguro Popular). Josué arrived at the Centro de Atención Integral (CAI) Un Nuevo Amanecer at the age of 3 years on June, 2017, recommended by a person that knew our work.

When he arrived we noted that he had communicative intent, although without language and he was alert to his surroundings. He needed to acquire working habits: improve motor skills, have coordination and more importantly, learn to communicate through the Mexican Sign Language (LSM) and verbal language. On August 2017 he was able to make the sign that means “mom” and he showed improvement in the verbalization of some words. This motivated him and reinforced his self-esteem.

For Josué, hearing aid is a fundamental element in his development. It has not been easy for his family to acquire the hearing aid: both the first he received when he was 3 years old (inherited from an older person) and the one that was later bought by his parents broke down. Therefore, he didn’t have a hearing aid during an entire year, until another person donated him another one of excellent quality, and in that way he could notably improve his verbal communication.

For Josué’s family, commuting from the Los Olivos community required walking up to the federal road and thereafter using public transportation, which represented an expense out of his parent’s economic possibilities. On October 2019, the family moved to Huatulco, to facilitate the transportation of the child to CAI Un Nuevo Amanecer.

We wish that Josué has a happy childhood from which he keeps beautiful memories and he reaches his full potential. In the CAI we hope that his family continues making the efforts they have done until now, in order for the child to attend to elementary school next year. We are doing our best to provide him with the necessary tools to do so.

Deseamos que Josué tenga una infancia feliz de la que atesore bellos recuerdos y que desarrolle todo su potencial. En Un Nuevo Amanecer esperamos que su familia siga esforzándose como hasta ahora para que ingrese el próximo año a la educación primaria. Ponemos todo nuestro empeño en brindarle las herramientas necesarias para lograrlo.

Josué’s case evidences the importance of an adequate and efficient rehabilitation program that may transform the future of people with disabilities. They only need to have the chance.