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“Fr

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Spe

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P.O

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544

• A

lcoa

, TN

377

01-0

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Bab

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with

Spe

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501

(C)3

org

aniza

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wor

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to e

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f ba

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and

you

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ren

with

dis

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thei

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and

the

early

inte

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tioni

sts

who

ser

ve th

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Dear Friends, “I was great. I am great. I will always be great,

and don’t you forget it!”, says five-year-old Wyatt to the mirror every morning. Wyatt struggles with a rare genetic disorder that seriously impacts what he can eat but doesn’t limit his desire to grow as a person. He learned this self-affirmation from his mother, Sarah M., who learned it from her high school band leader. She has now passed it down to her four children, aged five, four, three, and two – all of whom she adopted as ba-bies, and all of whom have special needs.

“They need people to dream big for them so they can dream big,” Sarah asserts. “They just need someone to believe in them, and I do.”

Friends of Tennessee’s Babies with Special Needs has been there to back Sarah up in her convictions about all her children, practically from Day One. When Wyatt was just a baby, Friends sent Sarah to a conference to help her gain vital information about how to care for his urgent medical needs. Then they helped purchase essential therapeutic sensory items for Wayland and Lynnie and a special chair for Emilia to give her the support she needed to sit up and eat. At one point, Friends delivered a huge supply of diapers, almost like a fairy godmother waving her wand, because all four needed them all at the same time.

It may look like magic, but Friends is composed of a small army of very committed people whose greatest joy is to give critical assistance at the exact moment of need without delays and red tape, because “Babies Can’t Wait!”

Since 1995, Friends has provided services to young children and babies with special needs in 16 counties in East Tennessee. Priorities include a hearing-aid loaner bank, respite care, family learning days and workshops, an educational library with specific materials and resources, care packages and baby showers for families of premature babies in the NICU, travel assistance for

out-of-area medical appointments, diapers, orthopedic shoes, and emergency family assistance. In addition, Friends offers a series of online training modules to help families learn techniques of care and how to manage their child’s lifelong financial needs.

Friends also hosts family events, including Zoo Day, monthly date nights, a trip to Ripley’s Aquarium, a night at a Smokies baseball game, and a huge winter holiday party. These wonderful times of celebration and fellowship provide precious network-ing opportunities for families who thought they were struggling alone and are delighted to find they are

actually members of a powerful community that shares many of the same concerns.

“It’s hard sometimes to navigate ‘typical’ society,” Sarah admits. “My little crew attracts quite a bit of attention, and it’s not always positive. So, when we walk into a group of people who see my children as whole with intrinsic value and possibility, it’s absolute heaven.”

Friends was delighted to embrace Sarah and her little crew. She demonstrates the very best

qualities to which any parent could aspire. And she does it while juggling doctor’s appointments, daily therapies, feeding issues, sensory, speech, and processing difficulties, and the lingering effects of Neonatal abstinence syndrome with which most of her children were born.

Please help us bring moms like Sarah into Friends’ welcoming circle of care. That way we can all look in the mirror and feel what Wyatt believes. “We were great, we are great, and we will always be great, and don’t you forget it!”

Warmest regards,

Taylor Livingston, Chair Friends of Tennessee’s Babies with Special Needs

MAY 2020

L to R: Wyatt, Wayland, Lynnie and Emilia.

Hap

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er’s D

ay!