Breathe
By Mariana Conde
The day my six-year-old daughter read the first lines of her favorite book by herself, I cried with happiness. This is no exaggeration.
It wasn't simply because she accomplished something I wasn't sure at the time if anyone with Down Syndrome could do, nor just to finally see the fruits of countless hours of therapy - I will never be able to adequately express my gratitude to each of her therapists - and entire afternoons spent reading at home.
The first thought that came into my head as I saw her sitting there reading aloud slowly and awkwardly, syllable by syllable, sentences that formed a simple version of Alice in Wonderland was: now she has the key, she can learn whatever she wants.
Being a reader opened the door to the world. She could read anything from an errand, to a loving card from her grandmother, to participating in learning at her school, to traveling wherever she wanted to go through stories. Which I can tell she does quite often.
