Author: anna-local

At the age of seventeen Chicagoan Brian Swift’s neck was broken while playing football with his friends on the sunny, chilly day after Christmas.  As he found the courage and strength to recover, graduate from high school, earn his college degree, and earn his Juris Doctor degree as a quadriplegic, he also found his purpose:…

Hello, my name is Cecilia! I am the youngest of five children born to Stanley and Veronica Zwanzig. My mother married my father at the age of twenty-five, which in the 1940’s was considered old for a woman. My mother was a very strong woman and a wonderful role model for us. My father was…

On September 10, 2012 James Sparhawk had a complete freak accident. He was too close to the edge on a roof of a 2 story house porch he was working on and fell. Due to his injuries, James became a complete T-10 paraplegic.  For a whole year, James stayed depressed. He decided to snap out…

Hey everyone my name is Carina Ortiz. Since I was born my life has been full of struggles, but I’ve managed to fight them successfully. I can say that I pretty much had a normal childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. In my free time , my hobbies have changed throughout my life, but some of them…

Betty Mekdeci is the Executive Director at Birth Defect Research for Children. Her website is http://www.birthdefects.org/about-us/. On her website, Betty tells everyone how she feels that her sons birth defects were caused by medications she had taken .  Betty says “Our son was born with a small, undeveloped right hand and shorter arm; pectus excavatum…

Hi, I’m Lauren. I am a 36 year old Mother of 3. I have all girls and their ages are 15,14, and 5 years old. My youngest Wren was born with Spina Bifida Myelomeningocele. Wren had to have surgery to close the opening in her spine that is the size of a baseball or large…

Hey! I’m Nicole Graves ! So, here is my story . I had a host of medical problems and complications over most of my life. Nothing any physician seemed inclined to research the actual cause of. Then, in 2011, I had my first of two strokes. I lost my left side, had to undergo significant…

SB in a Nutshell Life in a nut shell, I have always been one of those people who rarely speak of one’s own life and struggles on social media or anywhere. Mostly because to people every step I take is inspiring or motivating. That itself takes it’s toll on you.  Slowly in life, you become…

Hi my name is Krista. I have severe depression and anxiety and boarderline personality disorder and dyslexia and learning disabilities. It stops me from doing a lot of things I want to do I wanted to work with people with all kinds of physical and cognitive disabilities (different abilities) but once I got hired after…