Be Beautiful Be Yourself Archives

A Healing Balm for the Down Syndrome Community and Allies
A Healing Balm for the Down Syndrome Community and Allies

A Healing Balm for the Down Syndrome Community and Allies

The Global Down Syndrome Foundation each year hosts a fabulous event called Be Beautiful, Be Yourself. At this year’s event on November 14th, we’re going to celebrate. We’re going to cry. We’re going to push forward. I’m the mother of an adult with Down syndrome. There’s so much that I want to tell you, I hardly know where to begin…

Shall I start with 2020 and Covid? Of how scared I am…I fear the possibility that my very breath can bring in a virus that kills people with Down syndrome at

Mardra2020-10-27T13:43:26-05:00Categories: Grown Ups & Downs|Tags: Be Beautiful Be Yourself, CovidImpact, Down syndrome, Global Down Syndrome Foundation|0 Comments

Everyone Needs Help
Everyone Needs Help

Everyone Needs Help

A Gift From the Universe to Change the World

My son, Marcus, and I have had many writing sessions and meetings with collaborators at our neighborhood coffee shop, particularly while we were working on his first book for children and the accompanying animated short. We also wrote the speech we gave at the United Nations building there earlier this year. Today I write solo and the notebook to my right has the lyric, “The universe is resting in my arms” (from Nina Gordan’s song “Tonight”) written and

Mardra2020-06-16T07:17:43-05:00Categories: Grown Ups & Downs|Tags: adult with down syndrome, BBBY Ambassador, Be Beautiful Be Yourself, Black Day, Down syndrome, Global Down Syndrome Foundation, Marcus Models, Marcus Rocks, Marcus Speaking, Marcus' Wisdom, United Nations|5 Comments

Come So Far And Yet
Come So Far And Yet

Come So Far And Yet

Just less than thirty years ago, I was handed a book written for parents of a new baby with Down syndrome that began with, “Do not put your baby in an institution.” Literally, this was the first line of the book.

Still, a social worker asked if we were “taking the baby home.”

Sigh.

Today I know women who coach doctors and nurses about how to share information about possible, potential, and available, instead of “put away.”