Silent Does Not Mean Stupid

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Imagine you became quadriplegic and lost the ability to speak at the same time.

Despite your intelligence, you were shoved in a corner and made to sit all day in your wheelchair, listening to tales from ** ‘In the Night Garden’.

While Iggle Piggle and Upsy Daisy steal a secret kiss from behind the morbidly obese Harhoos, Maca Paca rides past on his squeaky scooter and stares at you.

You grimace as the Pontipine family (who look like a cross between miniature cardinals and animated clothes pegs) glide out of their house and mutter unintelligible sentences, almost like they’re mocking you because you are now non-verbal.

That’s it! You’ve had enough. You are an adult who did not lose your intelligence when you lost your leg muscles.

Just before the Titifers sing their song and rock back and forth like a worshipper at the Wailing Wall, you scream in your head. Nobody hears you. But deep within, you are experiencing torture.

How dare people jump to incorrect conclusions about what’s going on inside your brain? You lost your speech, not your mind!

Well folks, this is not dissimilar to what thousands of physically disabled children face on a daily basis.

Jonathon Bryan cannot walk, talk, or eat through his mouth, yet despite being only 16, he has accomplished amazing feats and overcome some of the most difficult challenges a child will ever have to face.

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Every word he communicates is spelt out letter by letter, yet he is an astounding author, having written his first book, ‘Eye Can Write’, at the tender age of 12. I have just finished reading the last chapter and I highly recommend it!

Jonathon suffered severe physical injuries while inside his mother’s womb, after she was the unfortunate victim of a car crash.

Living with Cerebral Palsy was hard enough for him, but what made things unbearable was that his special school refused to acknowledge that he was intelligent and eager to learn – and therefore, teachable.

They assumed that his physical disabilities dictated that he was also mentally retarded. And so, he and his other non-verbal classmates were made, even at the age of 8, to endure daily does of nursery rhymes, instead of being given a proper education.

Thankfully, his parents and other family / friends, did not give up by accepting this erroneous and extremely foolish diagnosis.

Today, Jonathon continues to campaign for other children like him to be given a voice and be taught to the standard of their intellect. He has met Prince Harry and Prince William when they presented him with an award and he has also met Michael Morpurgo, who happily wrote the forward in ‘Eye Can Write’. Jonathon has also been featured in several national UK newspapers, appeared on The One Show, and had a CBBC (Main UK children’s television network) documentary made about his life.

He is the founder of the charity, ‘Teach Us Too’.

Will you please take the time to read the excerpt linked here (Part 2) which is from his book? I am not placing it in the body of this text because it would make this post far too long!

Please also consider signing the petition to help stop voiceless children from being marginalised. If you require a little more empathy to motivate you, I graciously challenge you to go onto YouTube and watch two full episodes of ‘In the Night Garden’ in a row. Then imagine you could not escape from it because you had no speech and were imprisoned in a wheelchair.

So far, over 866,157 signatures have already been collected, but yours will make an extra impact for those children who are being treated unfairly just because of they are deprived of the ability to speak.

I have provided some links for you below. Please note that I am not an affiliate, nor did he ask me to do this. The only affiliation we have is that we are both passionate writers and more importantly, lovers of Jesus.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, for following the links and for signing the much-needed petition.

**’In The Night Garden’: A British TV show for the under 5s. I guarantee that after just one week of viewing this every day, you may be tempted to vandalise an object close by, or hurl it in the direction of the screen.

This is the link to his website and WordPress blog: ‘Eye Can Talk’

This is the link to his charity, ‘Teach Us Too’

This is the direct link to the petition (link)

This is the Amazon UK link to his book:

This is the Amazon.com link to his book

May God bless you abundantly.