Going to Camp with EPILECTRA
Becca, my Epilectra Project Manager, and I recently returned to Denver after a talk I gave at a camp for kids with diabetes. Becca handled all my AV. Here’s a summary of our camp adventure. Credit to Becca for the terrific pictures.
Becca and Sue on their way to camp
The Good
There’s nothing like the air in the mountains of Colorado. It’s crisp, fresh, and clean. And when you breathe deeply surrounded by trees, lakes, wildflowers, and bright blue skies, you feel like every breath of polluted oxygen inhaled in the city is banished from your body. This was a terrific way to feel just before I gave my recent talk at the Diabetes Counts Network Family Camp 2023 in Cedaredge, CO, the last Saturday in August. The annual weekend camp is for kids with type 1 diabetes and their families, and my talk – How to Turn Your Disability Into a Superability – was written with the goal of helping the kids and their caretakers understand that they are true superheroes. The camp facilitators contacted me after they came across the Epilectra website and liked the “disability empowerment” message it conveys.
Colorado’s blue skies and rocky cliffs
Sue on her way to give her talk, Turning Your Disability Into Your Superability
Beautiful camp lake
The Great
“It was an honor to have you as a speaker at our Diabetes Counts Network Family Camp. Your engaging talk clearly resonated with both the kids and their parents, sparking ongoing conversations that carried into Sunday. Your nuanced approach to discussing disabilities didn't go unnoticed, and the reviews have been overwhelmingly positive,” said Rob Harris, of Diabetes Counts Network.
How could I ask for more positive feedback? I know! Maybe when one of the kids, a 12-year-old blind girl with T1 diabetes asked me when Epilectra would be coming out as a movie. Or perhaps when another audience member, a 13-year-old boy, said he wanted to be the one to make the Epilectra video game (he especially related to Epilectra’s brother, engineering/tech savant, Logan Rivers). All the kids in the audience, as well as their parents were incredibly enthusiastic, and I had to pause many times for cheers and rounds of applause. The kids were also remarkably attentive and asked great questions when given the opportunity. I think my most challenging question came from a young man, around 12, who asked, “What will you do when all the disabilities you write about have cures?” I admired his optimism and paused a few moments. When I responded, I said with a smile, “Team SEEZ would through a big party to celebrate!” The hour long talk and half hour of Q&A probably could have gone on much longer, but the kids had other camp activities to attend to. I came away with almost no voice, feeling like I’d entered a room of skeptics and left one filled with proud, superheroes in the making.
Sue begins her presentation
It’s the superheroes from Epilectra BOOK 1 & 2
Sue answers kids’ questions
Kids with T1diabetes & their families listen
The Ugly
Camp kids – amazing! Camp flora and fauna – beautiful! Camp food – questionable at best. Instead of spending the night as originally planned, Becca and I decided to head back toward Denver after a somewhat unpalatable dinner of meatloaf and the prospect of sleeping on beds that had seen better days. But the weather gods didn’t agree and pummeled us with rain. Not only did we barely make it out of the camp (an hour of narrow, dirt roads before reaching anything paved), the highway closed two hours into our three and a half hour drive due to mud slides. We were forced to pull off in a small town and spend the night at its one motel, supplementing dinner with McDonalds fries.
***
We experienced 12 hours of extremes – in terms of weather, driving conditions, outdoor beauty, and our moods. But most importantly, the camp kids received an educational and uplifting interaction that they won’t soon forget, and Team SEEZ recruited a new class of young superheroes in training.