Hello Friends, A fellow blogger and author penned a short book about her family’s journey.  I want to share it with you now as we wrap up Down Syndrome Awareness Month.

 

From Grief to Celebration: How One Family Learned to Embrace the Gift of Down Syndrome

 

Margaret Bender took on the difficult challenge to put into words the day to day struggles and the “big picture” fears that parents of children with special needs face. From Grief to Celebration is a memoir/autobiography that reads more like a friendly “how-to” manual of parenting a child with Down syndrome.  However, Bender achieves this without being preachy or angry. No, instead she gives the readers small bites of advocacy and advice on raising awareness in each community.

Parents of young children with Down syndrome will most benefit from Bender’s accessible story of her family’s journey. This book is short (90 pages) and is broken into logical, easy to digest sections. Her honest appraisal of Alex’s strengths and quirks, and her hopes for Alex’s future are the threads that all weave together to form their journey to Celebration.

As a follower of Bender’s blog http://www.theextraordinarygirl.com, I appreciated the backstory, now that Alex has left home to attend a transitional college.

Above all, Bender’s story shows the world that people with Down syndrome are as unique from each other as we all are, but when it comes to following your dreams and wanting a full life, well there we are all more same than different.