PSA (Public Service Announcement): Midget is considered an offensive term. We prefer to be called by our name. And more appropriately, we prefer to be called a person with dwarfism or some prefer Little Person (LP). National Public Radio’s (NPR) World Have Your Say (#WHYS) asked: Have you been offended by a joke? Well, yeah, I’m a dwarf and a …
A Word About Dwarf Tossing: Degrading
An Average Height parent of an LP recently posted that a restaurant in New York is advertising a dwarf tossing event. She thought it was completely disrespectful and that it “goes back to the whole idea of little people being used for entertainment purposes.” This mom of an infant LP son encouaged people to call into the restaurant and voice …
Playing Musical Instruments in Grade School and Beyond
Question: I’m thinking of starting my older AH son on violin soon, which got me thinking, how that might work for my child with achondroplasia if/when he wants to start. Do any of your achon kids play? I guess they make violins small enough? Will his fingers make it around the strings? Does the asymmetrical posture have any impact on …
Low-Incidence Funding
When my husband and I were in grade school, there was no 504 or IEP for us. It was just a simple understanding between the principal and my parents that I needed some adaptations, which were very little due to just “having to work with it”. That was the 1970’s and 80’s where disability awareness was minimal at best. But, …
Finding Peace, Grace and Power: Words of Advice To My Children About Bullying
My grandmother was very wise in her years to instill the fire in my belly. But, I never knew how much that fire would need to be re-lit and fueled continuously throughout my life because people are just plain jerks. I’m not talking about the random, uneducated person that calls me a midget or the bratty 9-year old kid that …