Adaptive Parkour?

       Well, American Ninja Warrior is back on so Feisty Pants is thrilled. In case you don't watch, its a show about athletes running an extreme obstacle course based on a Japanese game show.  She likes the show almost as much as she liked the original Japanese version. That show absolutely fascinates her.   She could watch/listen to it for hours.  We never really were sure why.   It's in Japanese with subtitles which I don't think she could read (subtitles move too fast).  But who am I kidding, Feisty Pants is quirky bundle of awesome paradoxes.  For all we can tell, she could understand Japanese.  She certainly loves when people prat fall into mud puddles so the show is a hit with her all around.

           But now she watches in English so she can hear what's going on.   So she hears a lot about parkour.  (The free runners tend to do well.)  And soooo last night when they announced a contestant was a parkour instructor, she asked if she could take parkour classes.   Ponder that.  The kid who cannot stand or even sit unaided wants to go free running.  No way in hell do I EVER want to tell her she cannot.  I want her to expect miracles from and for herself.  I grew up with disabled siblings.  My family has quite a history of defying people's (especially medical type people's) expectations.  Mostly because we are stubborn and, to be honest, a little pushy.  We just see those qualities as virtues not vices. And it all starts with thinking "why the heck not?"   My mother once told me that when my sister was born with Down Syndrome (in '59), she went to doctor after doctor seeking a better answer than institutionalization or a shrug of the shoulders.  (It really was the dark ages for disabled children.) Finally a doctor told her," Don't lower your expectations.  If you expect a two year old to pick up their toys, then your two year old should pick up her toys.  It's your job to figure out HOW."

            But I cannot think of anyone who teaches a class like that who would want liability of teaching anyone, let alone a child, with Amara's level of disability. I can only imagine how much such an instructor would cost- it would have to be one on one or maybe even two on one instruction.   But again, no way in hell am I willing to simply tell her no.  I want her to shoot for the moon.  And even occasionally fail .  And then pick herself back up, dust herself off, and try again. And again.  And again, if necessary. 

             I want my very vulnerable youngest child to know, down in the very fiber of her being, in the very  marrow of her bones that she can do any damn fool thing she has set her mind on. Even something as stupid as jumping off buildings for the hell of it. Heck, she has already looked death in the eye and it blinked first. But how on earth do I figure out this version of how?