The facility I visited in Houston, TX, is called The Center. The Center has dedicated its entire existence to helping people with mental and physical disabilities. For the last 65 years, The Center has zeroed in on working with people who have Down's Syndrome. However, as the rate of children born with Down's Syndrome decreases, The Center is beginning to assist clients with Asperger's and Autism.
My assignment was to tour the facility looking for stories that would clearly communicate the fulfilled and projected goals of The Center, motivate donors to give or continue to give, and remind each person who is apart of The Center, (whether by working there, living there, or giving to the cause) of their irreplaceable value and worth.
I feel like a MAJOR part of my own personal story has continually intersected with the lives of people who have a mental or physical disability. My oldest brother Jonathan, was born with Beckwith Wiedemann Syndrom. He was just hours old when the doctors told my parents to say their goodbyes to their first born child. Instead, my parents circled the wagons and begged the Lord to spare Jonathan's life. It was always an incredible story to hear my parents tell, and now it's an incredible story to see my brother live day after day. God wrote His story of FAITHFULNESS on Jonathan's infant, 3 pound body, and continues to whisper in his ear, "My name is I AM, my name is faithful!"
From the age of eleven on, I would often visit my grandfather in a nursing home. At first, it was incredibly awkward and disturbing, nursing homes are hard, gut-wrenchingly HARD! So I simply acted, said, and mirrored everything my mother and father did. My mom was always calm, deeply sincere, never appalled at what she saw and always pushing the envelope of what other's felt comfortable with, (especially when it came to her Jesus :).... So I just moved forward with the understanding that loving people meant loving people well.... even if it was messy and awkward. It especially meant loving those in a nursing home.
Now, at 33, I cannot count the number of visits I have had to nursing homes. The number of times I've said "no" to my natural inclination to run away from "different", but insist my soul embrace the raw beauty in front of me.
And then two years ago, you could not keep me from the nursing home that housed one my most my precious possessions: my Mama. There was not a hint of hesitation, not a moment of considering the alternative, come hell or high water I was going to take up residence in that nursing home with my Mama. And so we did. Day after day, week after week, month after month, we were drawn to her, to this place that many are appalled to enter, we couldn't say no.
In addition to my other experiences with people who have mental and physical disablities, my brother Zach spent numerous years working with children with mental, emotional and physical disabilities. To visit him, his co-workers, and their inspiring students was a life altering experience EACH TIME. You want to find a hero? Look no further, these people pour every ounce of life and brain power into elevating the place and position of these amazingly, often marginalized, spirits.
In so many ways this assignment of writing for people who literally could not write their own story, was one of the most professionally-altering experiences I've had. More often than not, it is smooth sailing to write my OWN story. To tell each of you about my own experiences is easy because I own them, I feel them, I walk through them, but to write what other's are living, feeling, and experiencing took some serious gut checks along the way. I very much feel like I have been walking on sacred territory these last few months, trying to piece together something worthy enough to represent them.
I spent one day with 600 men and women who are physically and mentally disabled, and it was by far one of my sweetest days of 2014. I sat and listened to The Center's employees laugh and cry when they would introduce me to their dear clients through personal stories. I never seen a group of people swear such deep allegiance to one another as co-workers, and an unwavering loyalty their CEO, Eva.
Eva, oh Eva, if every CEO exhibited her class and commitment the world would be a very different place. Eva is powerfully-confident and unspeakably-humble. One of the most inspiring women I have ever studied. Her employees and her clients flocked to her as we toured the facility. They wanted to hug her, wave at her from across the court yard, and tell her all the details about the 30 minutes they had gone without her. "EeeeeeVVVVVVaaaaaa" one sweet, little client yelled! "EEEEEEEvvvvvvvAAAAA!" "Yes, yes, Glenn how can I help you?!"
His arms stretched out and his lip curled, "Huuuuugggggg!"
Y'all I can not tell you the number of times my eyes filled with tears as I swore to myself I'd return to The Center, but next time my entire family was coming!
There are so many stories I wrote, so many stories I witnessed, so many moments that I wish the world could see. One blog post could not even GET CLOSE, to conveying the beauty my eyes and heart beheld that day. I am not who I was. I changed because of the single day I spent at The Center.
One of my favorite stories took place in the wee hours of the morning. The Center has a high-rise, hotel-like, building for their clients to be able to experience independent living. Most of them would never be able to live on their own, but The Center has mapped out a perfectly precise way for them to each have their own apartments. Each are the size a hotel room, decorated and lived in like any other 20 year old would want. I got to stay the night in this jaw dropping facility. I had my own room, but the coziness of the clients surrounded me. I sat in the beautiful designed lobby, and watched a group of 3 girls, all with Down's Syndrome, check out with the "hotel receptionist" because they were going out on the town. They were dressed to the nines and grinning ear to ear. I went to bed long before they returned, but around 1 am, just outside my room, I heard them return. I quietly got out of bed and sat leaning against my hotel door. I wanted to hear what the commotion was.
"He, he, he does..does..not lllliike me any more" one broken soul sobbed.
"It's. it's, it's OOOO.KKKK" her friend consoled. "If he do not like you for YOU, than NO, NO WAY!"
"But, I SOOOOO sad!!!!" the crying one replied.
"Then I BEAT him!" her faithful friend replied.
I could hardly soften my hysterical laughter as the tears slipped over my eyes and my head slid back to rest on the door. Men, broken hearts, fighting words, and total girl drama filling the hallways of a independent living center for the physically and mentally disabled. It's miraculous, it's the unattainable story attained. Most would never believe it was a possible. Most would never believe that these girls with "disabilities" had the capability to even hold this classic conversation that every woman in the world has had. It was so real, it was so sweet, it was so unforgettable.
Speaking of unforgettable, I'll end with this... As I sat with Eva and listened to her tell me her story, she said something that wrote itself on my heart forever, "After working for my clients, for as long as I have been working for them, I have decided that after all these years we might have it ALL wrong; I've decided that they are the "normal" ones and we are the disabled!"
~Sara
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