Dave, Anya and I headed to Anaheim (90 minutes away) to take Anya to the national Little People’s Conference. Our dear friends live 1.2 miles away from the hotel and they were great about letting us stay with them. I figured it would be a bit too stressful on Anya to stay in the hotel that hosted the conference-there can be several thousand people that attend and I wanted her to have a place to unwind.
We headed down to the conference and signed in for the actual conference as well as for the track meet held by the DAAA (Dwarf Athletic Association of America) which was at 7:30am the following morning! Anya told us that she was scared, but she wouldn’t get angry or upset by all the little people at the conference. What a trooper.
The track meet was interesting. Anya hasn’t, as far as we know, run any races against people of her stature and age, or maybe even at all. We had to introduce her to “on your mark, get set, go” and Dave thought to tell her if she gets into the lead, not to turn around to check on everyone else. She was very excited to run and all she wanted was a medal. She saw pictures of winners with their medals on the DAAA website when I was showing her the different sport options.
Watching the softball toss with Papa.
Well, she is pretty tiny, even as a Achondroplasia dwarf, and has never run for any length of time before either. The first race was 60m and she was dead last. She gave a large disgruntled sigh when all the racers passed her and she slowed down. I was amazed that she finished the race at all. She eventually calmed down and there wasn’t a large melt down like I had expected. Anya did a softball throw and a plastic javelin throw as well. She wasn’t a medal winner but wasn’t in last place either. Dave and I asked her if she really wanted to run the second, 40m race. After Dave had talked to her about trying hard, lots of practice and trying something to see if you like it or not, she decided that she would run.
She started the race with all her might, went further this time before all the others took off past her, and was really frustrated. I started yelling to her to keep going, etc and low and behold, she bolstered up some energy and took off to finish the race. She was upset with herself and after about 20 minutes, she calmed down and was chattering about going to the beach next. Amazing.
I also realized something. I really don’t think Anya ever did anything that was really hard before. I can’t imagine that she was asked to do any difficult thing that took perseverance. I can imagine that she did hard things for something that she wanted, but probably not at the request of other adult. The closest thing would be her choosing to go to America, having to go to court and leaving Russia (which she basically explains to me as her ticket outta there). Lately she has had to deal with a profound amount of grief, learn a new language, learn a new culture, learn a new way life, learn to swim and begin to learn to read. I think the running just pushed her over the top. Plus she was evenly matched up against runners that came from around the country and there were even people from around the world (not in her group though).
We headed to the beach later and she had blast. She let the waves drag her to and fro, almost like body surfing and was really enjoying the whole experience.
The next day was the Fourth of July and we headed to the hotel in the afternoon. We looked at the vendors, I did a workshop presentation for “Adapting Your Home” and then we went out to the July 4th carnival. It was pretty overwhelming, so we let Anya do only one of the booths. She tossed the Frisbee through the hula hoops and won a prize. She chose a DVD game and on the way to the car, she informed us, “I got a little televizeeon with a timer.” See picture below. Poor thing. It was just a game. We ended up being in a news clip on TV that night from an ABC spot! We are walking through the lobby at the 20 second mark of the news blip.
ABC Little People Conference and DAAA coverage
click link above to watch news footage
That night we walked to a park near our friends' house to watch the fireworks from Disneyland. Anya loved her fireworks for her first Fourth of July as an American citizen! Overall, it was a good trip and we could see the great changes in Anya’s ability to cope and cope well. On to the next trip next time…
The next day, Anya and I met some other families with little people children for lunch at Downtown Disney. So glad we haven’t taken Anya to Disneyland yet, she was overwhelmed just walking around Downtown Disney. She was moving so slowly looking at things that we’ll have to plan on lots of time at Disneyland. We met Anya’s pen pal and we all went to The Disney Store together after lunch. That was a bit overwhelming too. But, she did pretty well and was able to choose one thing to buy.
~Monica
Anya gets her DAAA medal click the left link to watch her get the medal
You may notice that Dave gives Anya a speech in the video upon presentation. This is his way of dealing with children-to talk to them in an adult fashion while "tricking" them at the same time. He pretended that he was reading it out of the inside of the envelope. Only he got busted this time. Anya grabbed the envelope to see what was written and there was nothing there. Had to explain that it really didn't say that, but it was all still true!
I just love the video of Anya getting her medal. She is clearly just so tickled at the recognition. Super sweet. Thanks for sharing this with us!
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