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MY STORY
"I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted, and behold, service was joy." ~ Rabindranath Tagore Early on in life I learned the joy in service. Later in life I learned the joy in healing. Now I am finding the connection between the two, and the beauty is hard to comprehend. My name is Jenny. Thanks for taking the time to learn a bit about me and my cause. I was born and raised in El Paso, Texas, born with a cleft lip and palate, though cradled by a loving and supportive family who was able to give me the six surgeries, procedures, and orthodontic care I needed throughout my eighteen-year treatment journey. When I was born, there wasn't a cleft medical team in El Paso, so for most of my childhood I went to Phoenix, Arizona every few months for medical care. Most children who are born with similar craniofacial abnormalities aren't as lucky. Hundreds of thousands of children are born with clefts and other craniofacial birth defects without access to live-saving and life-sustaining medical care. The mission of Give a Little, Give a Life is to give back a little of what I was given: life. It's amazing how things always come back full circle. I've been raising funds for this cause for about a decade and a half, spreading resources out for medical care and healing practices, some local, mostly international. Now though, the giving goes back home. El Paso Children's Hospital recently trained and developed a cleft team that is becoming a model for Texas and the the U.S. Funds raised through Give a Little, Give a Life will be directed towards this team, to ensure that all border children who are born with cleft lips and other craniofacial abnormalities receive: 1) the medical care they need; 2) access to social-emotional healing spaces; and 3) family support and care (with a special focus on maternity care (and doulas) for mothers who are soon to birth these perfectly imperfect children. Love and Gratitude, Jenny Wechter Founder, Give A Little, Give a Life |
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