Sports fans and diehard Americans have yet to relinquish the euphoria experienced during the recent 2024 Olympic Games, held in one of the world’s most beautiful and historic cities, Paris, France.
Here in the DMV, many people continue to celebrate local gold medalists’ victories including Kevin Durant, Katie Ledecky, Torri Huske, Noah Lyles and – both from Bullis High School in Potomac, Maryland – Masai Russell and the 16-year-old track and field sensation, Quincy Wilson.
However, if you’d like more opportunities to root for local athletes, have no fear. The Paralympic Games have begun, again in Paris, bringing together more than 4,000 athletes on the grounds of the Champs-Élysées through Sunday, Sept. 8.
And while they will compete in many of the same sports, 22 to be exact, that we witnessed just a few weeks ago, this crop of athletes will be men and women who have overcome a host of disabilities while refusing to ever think of themselves as “disabled.”
Imagine participating in track and field events as an amputee, swimming the breaststroke and being visually impaired, playing basketball in a wheelchair because of spinal injuries, displaying one’s prowess as an equestrian despite being intellectually disabled, or challenging your opponent in archery while living with cerebral palsy. These are just a few of the sports in which athletes who are differently abled will compete, giving their very best and representing their countries, while inspiring the world to think differently about people with disabilities.
Some of the athletes we’ll see were born with physical or intellectual impairments. Others, either because of illnesses or accidents, now face life with a variety of disabilities. But like anyone else, they all have dreams, they all face and seek to overcome obstacles, and they all experience human emotions.
Today, you may not recognize names like Howard University alum Sydney Satchell, an NCAA Division 1 lacrosse player who graduated in 2014 and was left as an amputee after a car accident. But as a member of the Women’s National Sitting Volleyball Team, she’ll be in Paris, where she hopes to help her teammates become three-time gold medalists.
And there are other athletes from the DMV to look out for: Noah Hanssen (fencing), Trevon Jenifer (basketball), Nick Mayhugh (track and field), Lawrence Sapp (swimming) and Calahan Young (goalball). Each of them have overcome formidable odds to get to Paris – so they’re already winners.
Anyone can have a disability and a disability can occur at any point in a person’s life. In fact, using 2016 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System data, CDC scientists, looking to improve health care access for adults, found that 1-in-4 adults in the U.S. (61 million people) have at least one of the following disabilities: hearing, vision, cognition, mobility, self-care or independent living.
During his conversation with NPR’s Michel Martin at the 2024 National Book Festival, held in the District on Saturday, Aug. 24, the award-winning novelist James Mc Bride talked about his newest book, “The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store.” Set in a small town in Pennsylvania, the story centers around a young boy, living with cerebral palsy, who officials want to send to an institution. But members of his mostly Black and Jewish community, band together on his behalf.
As McBride, who once worked with children with cerebral palsy, said, “Don’t assume that just because someone is disabled means that they are any less capable than those without impairments. They’re just ‘enabled’ in different ways.”
As ministers in the Black Church often say upon hearing something profound, “that’ll preach.”
So, let the games begin!