Check out the new BLOOM: conta.cc/4mHg481

A former patient told me about their "favourite nurse." I knew I had to interview her. ❤️

My kids attended Spiral Garden when they were little. In this story, a mom talks about how it meets the needs of both her twin boys. hollandbloorview.ca/stories-news...

A competitive swimmer who suffered a brain injury found friends didn’t understand her new disability. 'They just didn’t act the same. It was like I was a new person in their eyes.'

Check out the new BLOOM: conta.cc/3URd7p3

Great read.

When 'it came to raising a disabled child, we didn’t know anyone in our circle who had gone through anything similar. So, I started building what we didn’t have.' ❤️

Reede Parisi is a popular sight when she appears at Holland Bloorview with a guitar strapped to her back and a cart full of shakers and drums. The music therapy student's connection with the hospital began when she was hospitalized here as a baby.

Check out the new BLOOM! conta.cc/4nb3te4

This mom was told her daughter, then 3, had one year to live due to a brain tumour. The daughter is now 23. The mom has written a book about the strategies she used to maintain hope and advocacy in the darkest times.

She came to the hospital as a 2-year-old for therapy. Now she's training here to be a clinician. hollandbloorview.ca/stories-news...

'As caring costs increase for families, barriers to paid work as a route out of poverty remain unchanged, including a lack of suitable childcare.'

'But we must remember that for all the medical information, the decisions people make about having a disabled child or being a disabled parent are shaped by fear and stigma. We need to talk about that a whole lot more.'

Check out the new BLOOM! conta.cc/4k6rEIo

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May be of interest to anyone who works with children with disabilities and their parents.

Interesting! www.npr.org/2025/05/15/n...

'Sometimes my two hours in Leticia's room were the only two hours I felt safe in a whole week. She's the only person I tell the hardest parts of my life to.' hollandbloorview.ca/stories-news...

Check out the new BLOOM: conta.cc/3GwVJlK

Must-listen on autism.

'The latest report from Jennifer Charlesworth’s office says up to 83,000 young people with disabilities are not receiving adequate services in the province + while spending has increased 190 per cent in the 18 years her office has been in place, most went to salaries + a narrow set of programs.'

'In clinic, we have a lot of hard conversations. We talk about losing the ability to walk. We talk about losing the ability to feed yourself. So I try to identify moments of connection, happiness and joy...'

In a qualitative study of 43 Black American caregivers of #Black #autistic youth published last month in Autism, 77 per cent had significant concerns about the safety of their child around police.

Another fabulous #WhoCares podcast covers the role of young #caregivers caring for siblings, parents or partners.

Starvation? In Canada? A woman w #DownSyndrome starves to death in a homeshare funded + overseen by the #BC government.

An agency had no idea how to manage a #disabled woman's anxiety related to doctor's visits, so she was allowed to starve to death instead? 👇

Check out the new BLOOM: conta.cc/3Wd86It

The connection between Terrence and Torrance Ho was built on shared passions. It was strained by their family’s unwillingness to talk about Torrance’s degenerative disease.

'How does a person in government care starve to death when there are supposedly safeguards in place, and checks and policies, and all kinds of people, that are supposed to be monitoring individuals who are living in home shares'

An oldie but a goodie.

'The existence of the review was revealed in reports about the death of Errol Graham, who starved to death in June 2018 after the DWP wrongly stopped his out-of-work #disability benefits, leaving him without any income.'

'Duncan founded Autcraft after realizing that his son—and many other children on the #autism spectrum—were experiencing bullying in online gaming communities.' 😍

'Running a restaurant in 2024 meant taking no salary while working a full-time hospitality job elsewhere in order to afford private health insurance. This is the cruel math of owning a small business + being #disabled in America.'

Autistic kids 'who are lonely at age 10 are three times more likely to have depressive symptoms when they're 14.'

'There's so much unmet need: people who could use AAC and don't have access. We don't have enough AAC clinics in Ontario. Depending on where you live, there may not be a clinic. And there are very few adult clinic'

'She told me that if I couldn’t manage him, I needed to take him to CAS and surrender him in the morning. I would never in a million years believe that a professional crisis nurse would tell me that.'

'Parents were accused of poor parenting; their concerns were not believed; or they were accused of neglect or Fabricated and Induced Illness (FII)—when a parent exaggerates or deliberately causes symptoms of a child's illness.'

'Studies show that youth like to have clinicians who have a #disability and may be more willing to open up to them.'

Yes! 'Most of the problems that #disabled activists have described as problems of #disability apply to sickness too. People w chronic illnesses often find they are put under great pressure to deny the effects of their condition.'

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How on earth is this 'care?' Sounds like torture. '...Declan had begun "bouncing off the walls", which resulted in a catastrophic brain injury...These injuries were sustained while Declan was being monitored by 8 CCTV cameras + under 24-hour observation'

No accountability for woman with Down syndrome who starved to death while in care in BC.

In the last year, 62% of British parents of kids w #disabilities have given up paid work or reduced hours, on average losing £21,174. 43% of families have gone w/o heating. 32% of parent carers have gone w/o food. contact.org.uk/wp-content/u...

People w intellectual disabilities are losing years of their lives hospitalized because no supports exist in the community. A problem in Canada, the US and Europe.

11 disability groups across Canada will work together to improve care and inclusion thanks to a $30 M donation from The Slaight Family Foundation. 😍

'...not until I became a physician did I encounter such extensive #racism. It ranged from having some patients refuse to let me touch them, to being more harshly critiqued than my white peers, to being told by a gynecologic oncology attending to “go back to Africa.”' pulsevoices.org/stories/surv...

In Canada, 'From 2013-2022 the poverty rate for people with disabilities was on average 2 x as high as the poverty rate for people without disabilities.' www.disabilitywithoutpoverty.ca/wp-content/u...

Woo hoo!😍