My Story with the Special Needs Community: One Conversation at a Time
I was introduced to the special needs and disabled communities during my junior year of high school. Looking back, it is a wonderful example of how one small conversation or suggestion can create a lasting ripple effect.
Alex Williams, still a good friend of mine to this day, suggested that I check out my high school’s “Chillin’ Chums” club after school one day. I thoroughly enjoyed my first experience, so that led to my involvement the next school year as a teacher aide for the special education classroom. I became great friends with one of the students in the class, and quickly wound up being his 1-1 tutor for the remainder of the school year; I stay in touch with him and his family to this day.
Simultaneously, an incoming freshman with down syndrome was joining our high school with aspirations of being involved with the basketball program. He became our team manager, the school’s ‘fan favorite,’ and now is one of my best friends.
There is plenty more to this story, but the bottom line is one friend’s suggestion to consider getting involved with these communities has led me on a path (albeit over the course of nearly 15 years) to where we are now. Several friendships with people with special needs that I will cherish forever, an assistant basketball coach role with Special Olympics Indiana, a published book to share the messages, and a renewed passion to encourage as many people as possible to join me.
I currently have one strong mission as it relates to the special needs and disabled communities. I consider it my duty as someone who was fortunate enough to be born with a typically functioning brain and body, to help and support those who were not. Through my experience working with such individuals, I have discovered that they have taught me more about life and helped me considerably more than I have them. That said, through aggressively marketing my book and ultimately speaking engagements, my mission is to spread awareness and help millions of people discover the power of connecting with the special needs and disabled communities, one conversation at a time.
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