“The world will become a better, more inclusive place, the day we accept children with special needs and expose them to normalcy as much as possible. Most often than not, they are kept within homes, in quarantine for a large portion of their lives out of fear of what ‘others’ would judge. But this process has not only proved detrimental to the children but even to those very outsiders who have very little idea of how to treat them properly.

And I can strongly vouch for this as a person who had no clue myself of the term ‘special children’ until my mid-thirties. It was, in fact, accidentally at a stage play in Kamaraj Auditorium that I even came across a bunch for the first time. They were of varying ages- some young adults as well, dressed beautifully with an encouraging display but weren’t even able to get up on stage without adequate help. Now as a mother of two, seeing this completely shattered my heart and I started bawling instantly at their plight. But somewhere amongst all that chaos, I knew then that I wanted to contribute to the betterment of those kids in any capacity possible.

So, as a corporate professional turned full-time homemaker, having a bit of spare time, I immediately divulged into equipping myself with all skills necessary to train these kids. And eventually, it didn’t come as a big surprise when I went on to complete my B.sc in Special education and Msc in Psychology in my forties. In fact, it was starting there that my journey has been the most enriching! I felt like I finally discovered my purpose and surrendered to it with complete interest and passion.

What’s better is realizing how much teaching has helped me too, in becoming a better human being. Today, I’m mostly involved in teaching kids with Downs syndrome and it moves me every time I witness a parent’s happiness seeing their child’s progress. My family personally, is as proud as they can ever be and they even pitch in once in a while to assist me technologically. Going forward I hope to impact many more lives positively, whilst attempting to make the world, less judgemental towards these children of god.”