One good reason to pick the Seahawks in Sunday’s Super Bowl

by Beth Finke

I’m rooting for the Seahawks in Sunday’s Super Bowl, and here’s why: they’re the only NFL team in the Super Bowl who signed a player with an obvious disability.

Seattle Seahawk running back Derrick Coleman is the NFL’s first legally deaf offensive player. He rushed for 1,700 yards and 19 touchdowns during his college career at UCLA, and he’s educated coaches at all levels of his career about his ability to communicate with his team.

Coleman was not drafted immediately after college, but the Minnesota Vikings signed him as a free agent in 2012. He was waived in training camp, and the Seahawks signed him as a free agent in December of that year.

A video the NFL produced about Coleman before last year’s Super Bowl does a great job showing how he uses resourcefulness to solve problems related to his deafness. It opens with a shot of his mother tearing up her pantyhose: she and Derrick figured out that wrapping it around his hearing aids cuts the feedback he’d been getting under the football helmet.

The video goes on to demonstrate how Coleman educated his teammates about his disability. He can lip-read, so he taught the quarterback to always turn around and look directly his way when giving audibles. The quarterback had to take his mouth guard out from time to time, too, so Coleman could see his lips. The filmmakers interviewed the Seahawks coach in the video, and he recognizes the extra effort that Derrick Coleman always puts in. “His work ethic is outstanding,” the coach says. “We just had to put him on the field to see if he could put it all together.” Obviously, he could. Put it all together, I mean. So well, in fact, that he helped the Seahawks make it to this Sunday’s Super Bowl.

Coleman won’t be playing in the game this Sunday, unfortunately – he was put on the injured reserve list after cracking a bone in his foot during warm-ups. I know he’ll be rooting for the Seahawks from the sidelines this Sunday, though, and you know what? So will I.

7 ways brain games helped a coma patient after awaking

by Beth Finke

I am pleased to introduce Debbie Hampton as a guest blogger today. Lifestyle and thought modifications, therapies, and mental health practices helped Debbie recover from a suicide attempt and the resulting brain injury. Her willingness to share her story now helps others to build a better brain, and consequently, a better life.

Debbie Hampton

Rebuilding My Brain

by Debbie Hampton

When I woke up from my coma, I was barely there. I couldn’t focus on anything, and my brain couldn’t make sense of what it was seeing. When I opened my mouth to speak, all that spewed out was garbled noises. My mutilated speech was disturbingly slow, flat, and mangled. My brain was working, but painfully slow.

A week earlier I had tried committing suicide by swallowing an assortment of pills, mostly brain drugs. I had survived, but my brain was stuck in a drugged stupor.

I eventually recovered enough to resume living independently, but I was still very mentally impaired. I had no short-term memory and unreliable long-term memory, an inability to focus, aphasia, poor people skills, no math aptitude, and little impulse control. The very good news was that I’d healed enough emotionally to decide that I did want to live, and I promised myself, “I AM NOT living like this!”

I started researching ways to rebuild my brain and tried everything from supplements and exercise to alternative therapies and brain training.

Brain training takes advantage of neuroplasticity, the ability of the brain to change its form and function throughout your life. Your brain is changing every minute of every day, and brain training exercises harness and direct this process. Just as you workout to exercise your body, you can exercise your memory, attention, and other cognitive skills to keep them in top shape. Benefits of brain training include:

• faster thinking
• better memory
• finding words
• sharper listening and vision
• quicker reflexes
• safer driving
• improved mood

Posit Science’s Brain Fitness Program — now offered as part of BrainHQ — is one of the first brain training software programs I purchased. The first Brain Fitness Program (I refer to it as BFP) exercise assessed my brain’s processing speed by having me listen to sounds that went up or down, called sweeps. At first it was infuriatingly difficult for me to tell which way the sound was going, and as I improved, the software adjusted to continually challenge me.

When I completed the program, I did another assessment and was thrilled to find that my processing speed had more than doubled. What a fantastic discovery! Something that substantially improved my brain without expensive doctor visits, medication, or therapy. All I had to do was sit at a computer and have fun.

I went through the BFP again and again until I stopped seeing improvement. I moved on to other brain training products after that, but I would run through the BFP again from time to time to give my brain a tune-up.

The effectiveness of brain training is still the subject of debate in the scientific community, but I’m convinced it helped me dramatically and was crucial to my recovery. Judge for yourself by following my blog, The Best Brain Possible, where I post about ways to improve your brain…and your life.

For a free unlimited sample of four brain exercises, try the Easter Seals Train Your Brain Challenge, too. Easter Seals also has brain health programs for both youths and adults and seniors.

Inclusive, accessible fitness opportunities you’ll enjoy

by Beth Finke

I am pleased to introduce today’s guest blogger, Laura O’Reilly, the Assistant Vice President of Health and Wellness at Easter Seals New Jersey.

Make safe and effective exercise a year-round resolution

by Laura O’Reilly, R.N.

Finita from the Be Well! program

As we resolve to make 2015 the year we finally stick to an exercise program, remember that the key to getting fit is staying with your exercise program all year round. Regardless of age and ability, regular exercise helps to improve health, prevent weight gain and increase strength and endurance. Once you get going, it feels so good. You just have to get started.

Participants of Easter Seals New Jersey’s Adult Day and Residential programs attend regular structured exercise classes with our staff of health and fitness professionals. They enjoy the class routine, which has become a part of their lifestyle, and they participate in physical fitness assessments to monitor their progress. Finita (pictured) is one of our participants –- she attends classes twice a week and says exercising makes her feel confident.

Watch Finita on our video below. You’ll also see how the program works, and how life-changing an inclusive wellness program can be. Inclusive in all ways: you can voice which exercises you like best. Find what you like and you’re more apt to stick with it. That’s why our exercise program was created by our team together with our program participants. They told us what they liked, how they felt, and we developed the program based on their needs.

As members of the National Center on Health, Physical Activity, and Disability (NCHPAD) Inclusive Health Coalition, we have had the opportunity to share Be Well & Thrive exercise classes in New Jersey in Essex and Passaic Counties. We continue to expand our program outreach so that safe, inclusive exercise programs are accessible to many individuals in their communities. I encourage you, no matter your ability, to visit the NCHPAD website to learn about inclusive physical activity opportunities and to reach out to your local Easter Seals affiliate to ask about ways they can help you reach your fitness goals.

All instructors who teach the Be Well! & Thrive Exercise program have been trained and assessed by our team before being awarded a certificate to teach classes, and to ensure that our program would improve body mechanics to perform activities of daily living with greater independence (and address safety concerns related to exercise) our team of personal trainers consulted with occupational and physical therapists, a pharmacologist and a sports trainer. Subsequently, Be Well! & Thrive became the first accredited assessment based inclusive exercise instructor training program with The Institute for Credentialing Excellence in the U.S.

Our program participants proudly presented their class sequence last year at the New Jersey Commission on Recreation for Individuals with Disabilities annual conference. The demonstration was followed by a question and answer session and our proud presenters were not shy about sharing their enthusiasm for the program. They continue to take classes, and they look forward to the routine and camaraderie.

When selecting an exercise program in your community be sure that the instructors are qualified to teach people of all abilities, and check with your healthcare provider before starting any physical fitness routine. Safety first!

Related Blog:

See how one woman is getting fit with the help of Easter Seals Iowa in 2015!

2 priorities from White House Summit on Elementary and Secondary Education

by Katy Beh Neas

Inclusive preschool

Stakes are really high for kids with disabilities (especially those under age 5) and the good news is that there are some significant happenings that could result in more opportunities for children with disabilities. The bad news? There are just as many happenings that could limit choices for these kids.

But let’s start with the great news first. Last month, I was invited to the White House Summit on Early Education. It’s always an honor to be invited to the White House, and to be able to participate and advance the specific needs and opportunities for kids with disabilities is really cool. I was the only disability advocate at this event, and the reason Easter Seals was invited is because of our deep roots and commitment to young children with disabilities and their families, as well as our strong partnerships with corporations like CVS Caremark and health and media channels like Parents Magazine.

Easter Seals has long argued that including kids with disabilities in early education programs increases the quality of these programs. If a program can help a child with a disability learn and grow, it can help a child with typical development learn and grow, too. That has certainly been my personal experience with my own daughter, now 15, who spent her early years in Easter Seals early education programs. Two very important priorities came out of the White House summit:

• Expanding the availability of early education programs, and
• leveraging public funds in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA).

ESEA is the law that finances education services to low income and vulnerable children, and every state in the country uses these funds to meet its obligations to children.

Now, the not-so-great news. The debate in Congress is pretty polarizing on education policy, especially on policy for students who have disabilities. Last week, Senate leaders published a draft bill on the Elementary and Secondary Education Act that does not include new options for early education. We will be working with Congress — both the House and Senate — to encourage them to elevate early education services in this bill.

One of the most compelling arguments from the White House Summit was about the economy. Research demonstrates that expanding early learning opportunities would provide benefits to society of roughly $8.60 for every $1 spent, about half of which comes from increased earnings for children when they grow up.

Simply put, its penny-wise and pound foolish to not expand early education options. Knowing that the first 5 years of life lay the foundation for a child’s success, Easter Seals strongly supports any effort to increase quality early education offerings.

A teenager’s feelings about her brother with autism

by Beth Finke

Last weekend I switched on National Public Radio and happen to catch the “Blood Is Thicker than Water” episode on a show called Re: sound. The show featured stories of families wrestling with love and loyalty, and one story, Except Me, was put together by a teenager who has a little brother with autism. The show set it up like this:

Andrew Skillings is 11 now, but he was first diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome, a high functioning form of autism, when he was just two. Andrew’s challenges impact the whole family, especially his older sister Marissa, who struggles to find normalcy in a life that revolves around her disabled little brother.

From early on, Marissa Skilling’s feelings about her younger brother vacillated between love and hate. In her recorded essay, she acknowledges that some days she wanted to hug him, and other days she wanted to strangle him. Except Me is a very honest — and sweet — piece of work. If you missed hearing it last weekend, you can still hear this award-winning essay online.

Visual art made accessible, part 2

by Beth Finke

Think a writer who is blind has nothing to learn from a visual artist? Think again!

I wrote earlier about an architect friend who found a way to make his art accessible to people like me, who are blind. Now I’m back with another friend in the visual arts whose art is accessible in another way.

That’s Jennifer, undaunted by the rain.

I met visual artist Jennifer Lanski during my writing residency at the Vermont Studio Center (VSC). Sharing meals with Jennifer and her fellow visual artists at VSC gave me a new appreciation for art and drawing, and I was all ears when Jennifer shared ideas for a new time/temperature series. That series opened as an online exhibition on New Year’s Day this year. It’s called 2014 in 2015 and I’ve been going to the site every day so far in 2015.

Let me try and explain. At the end of 2013, Jennifer decided to go outside and draw every single day in 2014 as an extension of her time/temperature series. Each and every day in 2014, Jennifer determined how long she’d be out there drawing by the temperature outside that day. If it was 22º Fahrenheit at the moment she began drawing, she’d be out there 22 minutes. On days it was 90º? She’d draw for an hour and a half. She couldn’t give me one single answer on how she decided to do this. Instead, she gave me many:

• She wanted to explore her new neighborhood, having moved to Fairfax, Ohio, from California only 6 months earlier.
• She wanted to be allowed the time and space to draw; to demand that from her family, herself, and the world.
• She wanted to make herself be outside every day, despite her instinct to huddle inside through the long, cold, grey, winter months.
• She wanted to challenge herself.
• She wanted to see how this daily project would develop.
• She wanted to see how she’d respond to the struggles that would inevitably come from taking on this project.
• She was interested in what it means to be an artist in the world in the 21st century. So she wanted to put herself, as an artist, into the world to find out.

As 2014 was coming to a close, Jennifer says the question of how to show the work kept nagging at her. She’d been convinced by other artists that she needed to show every single drawing from the project, but she couldn’t figure out how. And where.

“One morning I woke up and suddenly had the solution,” she wrote me in an email. “I would have an online show, but instead of showing all the drawings at once, the show would change daily and run for the entire year of 2015.” So starting on January 1, a new drawing appears online each day, and the next day a new one comes up to replace the one from the day before. The drawing that appears each day is the one she drew exactly one year earlier.

Jennifer knew that I wouldn’t be able to appreciate her drawings. “But maybe there is something you could get out of these drawings, too,” she said, explaining that along with every day’s image she’d be printing a “transcript” of the small text that appears below each drawing. “You’ll discover the place, date, time, description of the weather, the temperature, my clothing, and then sensory and environmental information from the experience of drawing that day,” she said. I “met poet Evie Shockley at the Vermont Studio Center when I was there again in July, and she said my text was poetry, though I’m not sure I would go that far.”

To see Jennifer’s show in its entirety, you have to visit the website every day in 2015. I’ve been doing that so far this year, and reading her transcript is a neat parallel to what her experience was like every day last year…but I don’t have to go outside! I’ve made a resolution to visit 2014in2015.com every morning so I can start each day with Jennifer’s poetry — consider joining me to see/read about a new drawing (the image she drew that same day last year) every day. If you do, weigh in here from time to time to let me know what the drawings look like.

7 ways we’re supporting veterans and military families right now

by Col. David Sutherland

Since our start in 2012 with the support of founding partner Prudential, Easter Seals Dixon Center and Easter Seals Military and Veterans Services work around-the-clock to assist veterans and military families with the solutions they need to live productive, successful lives in their communities.

Last year we worked with nearly 165,000 vets and military families. We’re looking to top that in 2015. Here are seven shining examples of how we are supporting veterans and military families right now.

1.    Caring for Caregivers

Through a contract with the Department of Veterans Affairs, partnerships with the Elizabeth Dole Foundation and the USO and a grant from Newman’s Own Foundation, we expect to train more than 15,000 in 2015 caregivers on important skills such as self-care, home safety, veteran personal care, and managing difficult behaviors.

We also post the videos and downloadable resources from our bimonthly webinar series for military caregivers on easterseals.com/carewebinar.

2.    Hotline Help

Full-time staffers manage Community OneSource^SM, a dedicated toll-free number and email where veterans and military families can request benefits information, assistance basic financial, health/well-being and education services, and resources for everything from legal aid to housing to caregiving. Our staff connects these individuals to the right resources and follows up to ensure that viable options have been found. Need a hand? Call 866-423-4981 or email us at veterans@easterseals.com.

3.    Influencing the Influencers

Our Washington, DC-based government relations team works to influence federal and state legislation affecting veterans and military families. The new 114th Congress convening this month includes 60 new members and leadership changes on key committees (Armed Services, Veterans Affairs, and Appropriations) that govern policies and funding for veterans and military families. Our team is on the Hill introducing ourselves to these influential individuals, advocating for community-based solutions and highlighting the needs of military families, veterans and the families of the fallen.

4.    Employing Vets to Promote Vets

Judd Apatow

Our third public service announcement (PSA) video, which uses light humor to challenge people’s perceptions of veterans and reinforce their positive employment attributes, will have a cast and crew comprised almost entirely of veterans who are building careers in entertainment, as did the first two PSAs in the series. This 3rd PSA will be directed by Jim Fabio, a former Air Force Combat Camera Officer, under the guidance of Hollywood director, producer and writer Judd Apatow. Production is scheduled for the first quarter of this year with a May release date.

5.    Supporting Female Veterans

We administer the Women Veterans Financial Assistance Project, made possible through a grant from Aetna. This program allows Easter Seals affiliates or other community organizations to refer a woman veteran, her spouse, caregiver or child to Easter Seals Dixon Center for financial assistance in case of an emergency. Food, housing, infant supplies and/or transportation are some of the covered areas.

6.     Affiliate Services Across the U.S.

Of our 73 Easter Seals affiliates and their 550 on-the-ground service sites across the nation, 15 have distinct programs for veterans and their families, while the remaining 58 include those touched by military service in their daily services. Two examples:

•    Camp Yellow Ribbon, operated by Easter Seals Southeast Wisconsin, gives military families a break with a week of free summer fun for kids ages 7-15 with parents who have been, are currently, or will be deployed.
•    Veterans Count, operated by Easter Seals New Hampshire, provides financial assistance and services to veterans, service members and their families to ensure their dignity, health and overall well-being.

7.    Putting Vets in Meaningful Careers

We work with everyone from the Teamsters to the Society for Human Resource Management to inform and influence credentialing and employment programs, as well as provide wrap-around services such as transportation and child care. Advice might include on-the-job training on military installations to educating HR professionals on ways to understand a military resume. Easter Seals affiliates have a stake in this effort, too:

•    Veterans Staffing Network, operated by Easter Seals DC | MD | VA, offers temp-to-perm and direct-hire solutions for veterans, National Guard, Reserves, wounded warriors, and their spouses.
•    WorkFirst, Easter Seals Southern California and Operation Vets THRIVE, Easter Seals TriState, provide employment services and referrals for veterans and families transitioning out of the military and integrating back into communities.

One easy way to fight obesity in people with disabilities

by Beth Finke

The well-being initiatives at Easter Seals Iowa earned them a Blue Zones worksite designation last year, and I’m pleased to introduce Easter Seals Iowa’s Wellness Coordinator Melanie Asbe as a guest blogger today to tell you about their wellness efforts.

Go, Mary-Kate, Go!

by Melanie Asbe

Mary-Kate

Obesity rates for children and adults with disabilities are far higher than rates for children and adults without disabilities, according to reports from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. With this statistic in mind, Easter Seals Iowa has made a commitment to make our organization a healthier place to work. We’ve made tangible changes to our worksite environment and have started programs to support the well-being of our clients and employees.

One example: we’ve piloted a Fitbit competition between staff and clients in one of our departments. The Fitbit is a wireless activity tracker that is worn on the wrist. During the day, it tracks steps, distance, and calories burned. At night, it tracks your sleep quality and wakes you silently in the morning.

Mary-Kate Dorrlacombe, an Easter Seals client who has a developmental delay, saved her money for half of the cost of a Fitbit and one of the departments at Easter Seals Iowa contributed the other half of the funds. In just two weeks of having the Fitbit, she lost three pounds. Mary-Kate sends staff weekly summaries of her total distance, steps, sleep, and calories burned, and she feels she’s come a long way since using Fitbit. In her words:

• I find myself doing things I wouldn’t imagine I would’ve been doing five years ago.
• I find myself eating healthier and trying new foods.
• I find myself working out regularly and playing lots of sports.
• I find myself going out of my way to use the steps instead of the elevator.

Mary Kate also says her Fitbit has given her more confidence in her decisions to be healthy. She was able to cut soda pop out of her diet completely and continues to lose weight since purchasing her Fitbit. Staff and fellow clients at Easter Seals Iowa are very proud of Mary Kate and can’t wait to see where this will take her in 2015. Happy (Fit) New Year!

Easter Seals works with the National Center on Health, Physical Activity and Disability (NCHPAD) to support accessible fitness facilities, activities and programs in local communities.

Visual art made accessible, part 1

by Beth Finke

I’ve written here before about people trying to make visual art accessible to those of us who can’t see. I know they have good intentions, but I think they try too hard. It’s called visual art for a reason: you need your eyes to take it in.

Every piece of art tells some sort of story, however, and when you think about it, the creation of every piece of art is a story in itself. Rather than jump through hoops to let people who are blind touch visual art or use our other senses to take it in, how about simply telling the story of how the work was created? People who are blind can appreciate a good story, and those with vision will benefit from learning the backstory as well.

This past month two visual artists I know sent me wonderful stories about their work. I’ll tell you about one of them today, and introduce you to the other one in my next blog post.

Steve Wierzbowski is an architect who lives in our apartment building in Chicago. When he’s not designing buildings, he enjoys bike-riding along Lake Michigan and stopping here and there to draw a sketch. This past year Steve teamed up with a couple other artists — one works in video, and the other is a musician — and the three of them collaborated on an entertaining video about Steve, his bicycle, and the creation of two drawings.

You can see and/or hear Steve tell the stories behind his sketches in the “Two Sketches” YouTube video below. Whether you can see or not, you’ll learn a lot from “Two Sketches,” I promise.

How can autism free you to be yourself?

by Cathy Pratt

Rosie King

In her TED Talk “How Autism Freed Me to Be Myself,” Rosie King provides an important perspective on her autism spectrum diagnosis. From the TED Talk website:

People are so afraid of variety that they try to fit everything into a tiny little box with a specific label, says 16-year-old Rosie King, who is bold, brash and autistic. She wants to know: Why is everyone so worried about being normal? She sounds a clarion call for every kid, parent, teacher and person to celebrate uniqueness. It’s a soaring testament to the potential of human diversity.

As a society, we are often most comfortable with stereotypes that allow us to “systemize” or make sense of the world. These stereotypes allow us to classify, organize and categorize people into neat little boxes, establishing expectations of what a person is and what they will become. All too often as we establish programming for any individual with a disability, our goal is to help them become “normal”…whatever that may mean.

Rosie King reminds us of the importance of creativity and non-conformity and of thinking outside the box. Her uniqueness has allowed her to have a refreshing and honest perspective of the world that has resulted in multiple creative outlets, including a book and lectures. Most important, it has allowed her to have a better understanding of her siblings – both are non-verbal and on the autism spectrum.

Several years ago, during a panel discussion of individuals on the autism spectrum, an audience member asked the group to name a key factor in their success. The overwhelming response from panelists was….acceptance.

That response continues to resonate with me and serves as an important reminder in the work I do. While I absolutely embrace the importance of good programming and ongoing supports, part of our efforts on behalf of individuals on the spectrum should also be in celebrating the strengths and unique qualities of each person and in interacting in a manner that demonstrates acceptance and appreciation of these differences.

Every person has something to contribute. Rosie King’s speech proves that to us.

Related Resources on Easterseals.com:

What’s it like to live with Autism Spectrum Disorder?

What’s it like to have Autism Spectrum Disorder as an adult? Aaron Likens shares with us in this blog post.