What a Joy!
A part of every high school students high school experience is going to the prom. A night where you dress up, dance away the night, hang with friends, ect...
Unfortunately, for some students thats not always an option. In the case of my son Chase, who has Down Syndrome, going to the school Prom wasn't going to be an option for him this year. He is a junior this year, so he qualified by grade to go, but no one else in his class was going and I had been told by some of the students that help out in his class that the Special Ed students normally don't attend. I assume the reasons they don't attend are the same reasons I wasnt going to let Chase go as well. Possible drinking, the issue of a date, possibly not feeling included, so forth so on.
As a parent, I totally agree with those reasons and sadly had to give Chase the shoot down on the Prom when he came home talking about it. However, little did I know, he wasn't talking about the school Prom, he was talking about something called the Joy Prom. A local church every year hosts a "prom" for students 15 and older that have special needs and its called the Joy Prom. He came home talking about his possible date for the Joy Prom and the dinner plans being made and I'm just standing there wondering what he was talking about, until I got the sweetest phone call.
One of Chase's best friends is a sweet girl that is part of the Project Unify and helps out daily with Chase's class. She was calling me to see if she could take Chase to the Joy Prom. She proceeded to tell me about Chase's other classmates that were planning to go and some of the other students that help in Chase's class were going too as some of the "chapperones/dates". After discussing it with her and a few days of thinking it over, I gave in and plan to let him go. I have gotten to know Chase's sweet friend over the past few months and I really felt comfortable with her as Chase's "date". I knew he would be in good hands for the evening.
Formal attire is welcomed, but I went for a more casual attire for Chase, so that he would be more comfortable.
As the plans were being made, we discovered that Chase's sweet friend and date had a school softball game that evening, but luckily, her coach was able to have the game time moved up earlier so that she could still take Chase that night.
Her game began at 5:30 and of all nights, it went into over time! As her mother and I stood there giggling about how good the game was, we were saying to each other, "of all nights!" Finally the game ended, and we were off in rush mode. She ran off the bathroom to freshen up from a hard played ball game, I ran chase to the parking lot to do a SuperMan change of clothing in the car.
Boy does she clean up fast and as always so pretty! Chase sweetly helping put her flowers on her arm.
His first night out with friends and he got to stay out late(which was important to him). He had a blast and my heart is just so warmed with knowing he has friends that care enough about him and other classmates too to be willing to take up their Friday night to do this. They certainly have a speical place in my heart!
