Single mother Asilene Sammy and her six year old Down Syndrome child Aaliyah are calling for financial assistance as their daily lives remain a challenge. Sammy said that to access basic social services is a task, especially when a prescription is filled out in Trinidad and has to be collected in Tobago.

"I have to fill part of it at Scarborough, is like this did not come from here, go back to the ward and let the doctor write a new prescription for you, and sometimes when you go, the doctor will tell you listen he is not here or come back tomorrow. I can't be running up and down like that," Asilene Sammy said.

Sammy's monthly income is $1,800; she wants more funds to be made available for parents with specially challenged children by the government. She shared with us her experience when she first approached the Division of Social Services for assistance.

"Well at first it was nasty, real nasty, and when I went to collect the special grant cheque for my child, I was asked, 'what you come here for?" she said.

The mother has to walk along a drain to traverse to and from her home.

Her child presently attends the Tobago School for the Deaf Speech and Language Impaired located at Bon Accord Tobago.

"Access to where I am living is really really bad. Today is probably a good day as the sun is out a little, but when it's raining I stay in," she said.

For support, Sammy, along with other mothers like her, find comfort with each other.

Meanwhile, Lisel Glasgow of Fort Street Scarborough is the custodian of a child with cerebral palsy. She says she has worked hard to maintain proper living quarters for her daughter and herself but admitted that life continues to be hard. She carries her child to and from her home on her back and now she suffers with severe back pains.

"Every day twice a day or as often as we leave the house I would have to do that, and it is really really challenging," Lisel Glasgow said.

This mother said every night she sits in her gallery and cries, wondering what tomorrow will hold.

"I will like the government to help all children, special needs children, because I think for far too long they have been on the back burner," she said.

She said her financial constraints are almost impossible as she is challenged to survive on less than $900 monthly, and in the recent past had to hold a fundraiser to buy her daughter a wheelchair.

"We started having barbeques along with my mom's friend and two family members came around, and they helped. It was quite successful, and then and there I was able to buy her a new wheelchair."

She said people do not understand the depths of dealing with a child who has special needs and care.

"They judge you when they see you because you are looking nice and you have pretty hair, and the child is clean."

This mother is adamant that if she had to do it all over again she would not change a thing.

Help has also come to the family of Lisel Glasgow and her seven year old child Genesis David. Members of the National Commission for Self Help journeyed from Trinidad to Tobago and once the OK is given, this mother may soon not have to carry her daughter on her back anymore.

"The National Commission for Self Help is quite happy to be here, and to promise to build a wheelchair ramp, so that this child would have access to this house. So that her mother would have ease of access with the child," CEO of the National Commission for Self Help Reynold Baldeosingh said.

The National Commission for Self Help is hoping to make life easier for the family of Lisel Glasgow who was in tears upon receiving the good news.

"I am overwhelmed, just that I am surprised am overwhelmed. I am just so happy; I can't thank you all enough. Thanks so much. I know that there is a God and I would never give up on her (my daughter)," she said.