Even though interviewing others can be frightful, it can also be informative. So far I’ve learned that there are all kinds of people out there and just because someone looks different from most, doesn’t mean they are any different on the inside. I had the opportunity of interviewing a student from Pierce who happens to be a small person affected by achondroplasia. She is the only little person in her entire family affected by this condition. What I got from the interview itself was a perspective I hadn’t the slightest clue about. Like how someone is treated when they appear different from everyone else. Emelyne told me about her past and how growing up was like for her. She told me about how the kids bullied her at an early age, till she got older and how things changed for her. There was a turn around in how she was treated once she went into middle school and throughout high school.
Most people don’t and probably will never know what it is like to be born so differently than everyone else. But for Emelyne that was the case, she had to learn to adjust to her life and accept herself. With the help of her family and members of the LPA, she became comfortable in her own body.
“I always go by don’t judge a book by its cover” Emelyne said. “I feel like people should get to know me, I’m just like you. I just look a little bit different, but I’m also a person, I am a human being.”
Emelyne does all the regular stuff any normal person would do on a daily base. She drives, she shops, she goes out, she is a student, a sister, a daughter and overall an amazing kindhearted person. She knows not to take another person’s ignorance to heart, especially when they don’t know her personally. She brushes off comments that are not pleasing, because she is settled into and comfortable with who she is. She is the type of person who will not let her stature define who she is or who she wants to become.
