Joshua was born August 20th, 1997 at University Medical Center in Tucson, AZ. He was eight weeks early. At birth, nurses noticed that his arms and legs were smaller than normal. The head nurse thought this was due to Down Syndrome. Tests were ordered and two weeks later it was confirmed that Joshua was born with Trisomy 21. It was all a whirlwind to me. I felt alone. I felt that the doctors had made a mistake and had switched Joshua with another baby. Of course, this was not true. I had to try to understand why did I have a child with a disability. I had seen other parents with children with disabilities and I never thought it would happen to me.
The “fun” was just starting. Doctors, specialists and nurses came into my room at the hospital. Josh was enrolled in Early Childhood Intervention. All within one year, Joshua was receiving speech, occupational and physical therapies. All of these were necessary for his development in later years.
Joshua achieved a major milestone at 18 months when he started walking. At this age, he also signed his first word, “more”. His first word was “dada”. Each day that has passed, there have been more changes and development. He grew up on a small farm with a garden. Small animals like goats, chickens, and dogs. He also had a pony that he rode and even a donkey. All of these stimuli were great in his development.
August 21st, 2000, Joshua graduated Early Childhood Intervention and attended Quinlan Independent School District (QISD), in Quinlan, Texas. He was now a preschooler. He would spend the next five years in QISD. He was continuing to learn sign language, simple tasks like dressing himself, hygiene, and the wonderful potty training! The teachers and therapists were great at explaining what my husband and I needed to do in order to help him flourish. This was hard. We had a lot of battles and I had to pick the ones I wanted. He once wanted to wear a cowboy boot on one foot and a tennis shoe on the other to church; that was a battle I did not want to engage in, so he wore them. People thought it was cute and he never wore two different shoes again—PICK YOUR BATTLES!
Joshua has grown up with his Mom and Dad and two brothers, Thomas and Micah. The family moved from Texas in November 2005 to Radcliff, Kentucky where he currently lives. He attends Meadowview Elementary School. He is a very active child. He loves to bowl, play baseball and soccer. He is currently training for Equine Special Olympics that will be held in Lexington in October. He also attends a summer camp each year and loves to go to a play group called Parents in Action.
He calls himself a cowboy and his signature is his boots. Everywhere he goes he has them on. He loves cowboys, horses and, of course, the rodeo. He would like to ride a bull one day, but Mom is not sure if that will happen.
Joshua loves to eat hamburgers. He would eat hamburgers 365 days a year and 3 times a day if he could—look out Wimpy! He makes sure that each hamburger has mustard, ketchup, mayo, lettuce, pickles, onions and tomatoes. He inspects each one to his specification.
Joshua loves life and especially people. He is a stranger to no one. People come up to me and say—“Hi, you’re Joshua’s Mom. Please tell him ‘Hi’.” And I am thinking I do not even know you. He just loves to be a social butterfly and I would not change Joshua at all. He is a joy in my life and in so many other people’s lives, too.
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