Reflection: The Lotus Hope Foundation Impact Awards

A little over a week ago, I attended The Lotus Hope Foundation Awards, as one of the top 5 finalists in the Global Impact Award category - and had such a beautiful time.

In the few days leading up to the award ceremony, I'd jokingly say to my boyfriend "the real global impact is the friends I made along the way," and even though it sounds cheesy as hell (I do not care, I stand by it!) it feels so TRUE.

Less than 4 years ago, I rarely ever talked about the rare neuromuscular disorder I was born with. Like, people I worked with for over 5 years had no idea.

When I first started sharing my experiences of living with an invisible physical disability, I never thought of things like

• Being honoured on the global D-30 Disability Impact List by Diversability®
• Being one of the faces on a Rare Disease Day worldwide campaign poster
• Getting 13 monuments across Canada to light up for Invisible Disabilities Week
• Becoming the first Canadian ambassador for the Invisible Disabilities® Association.

But what I ESPECIALLY never thought about — what high school, university and even 20-something me never even thought was possible — was connecting with other people around the world, who have the exact same rare disorder I do.

Over the last few years, I've had LinkedIn and WhatsApp messages with Rajiv, who lives in India.

I've had IG comments from Annika and Emily, who are in Germany and Australia.

I've had video calls with Jackie in California, Ashley in Texas and Carrie in England.

I actually met Carrie last summer, my first time ever meeting someone else with Central Core Disease in person!

That's not even all of the people who share my disorder (or have children who do) who I've connected with over the last few years - and I'm SO excited every single time it happens.

July is Disability Pride Month, and if there are two things I hope people with disabilities who are afraid to talk about them take away from my experience, they're this:

One, we're never as alone as we think we are.

And two - sharing our experiences can have ripples of impact for so many others, far beyond anything we can picture for ourselves. ✨

Happy Disability Pride Month! 🎉🫶🏽