Summary Life after college for Ali- A Ruby's Rainbow Story (Youtube) www.youtube.com
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Ali- The driver seeks forgets to steal.
n/a This is my dream you guys. To 1 day see my own daughter with Down syndrome do what Ali- Hale is doing right now.
Ali- Do you like to play in the mud? Yes.
n/a Earning a living, at a job she loves, and at a job that loves her.
n/a We were all very impressed with her. She came in with her resumes ready, and she answered questions very professionally. She blew us away in the interview.
Ali- Okay. Matthew, what tip do you want?
n/a Ali- has earned a Ruby's Rainbow scholarship that helped her attend Western Carolina University. But now that college is over, she's working as an assistant preschool teacher in Hickory, North Carolina. My pal, Ali- Hampton, is back again. This time to help me answer a big question. What's life like for an adult with Down syndrome after they leave college and enter the real world?
n/a Oh my gosh. Hi, Ally.
Ali- Hey. How are you?
n/a We're good. So tell us a little bit about your job.
Ali- Life in general, I just like working with younger children.
n/a Yeah. That's your favorite part?
Ali- That's 1 of my favorite parts. It's about interacting with the kids.
n/a And what helped make you successful? What's 1 thing that you did that was hard that
Ali- Just to be independent by
n/a Not letting your mom and dad do everything for
Ali- you. Yes.
n/a Yeah. Oh.
n/a That's hard for the mom and dad.
Ali- It is. Yes. Sometimes my some sometimes my mother gets on me.
n/a Yes. We get out of town.
Ali- She still is Yeah. She is still doing it, but it's fine. But I need some space, mom. I need to do what I need to do.
n/a There's always
n/a a lot
Ali- of don't have to say it to me. I know. I normally lay lay this towel on the town of
n/a What makes Ali- so valuable to her bosses is her positive attitude.
Ali- I've knocked his arms right now.
n/a From administrative work to sterilizing the toys.
Ali- This is my list. I do each day each day whenever I come.
n/a There's no task Ali- isn't willing to tackle with a smile. Probably 1 of
n/a my favorite things about her is that she is very confident. She is, I've got this. I know exactly. Life I don't know how to do it, I'm okay because I'm gonna
n/a ask. James?
Ali- Cool. What what's say, it's this. Open. What's up?
n/a To help Ali- be successful in the workplace name is this. The preschool directors met with Ali's parents and even a job coach to figure out where her gifts and talents would shine best.
Ali- Hypers is circle.
n/a What
n/a we have kind of figured out over the last 2 years is the more things that we have that she knows what to expect and that she kinda has in her her routine, the more successful she can be. Copy She will always ask us for clarification, ask us for questions. She's always willing to try new things. But I also think she likes having her own set of responsibilities, and she knows what those expectations are when she comes in the door.
n/a And would you say that the process was worth it?
n/a Oh, absolutely. Every day. I mean, when she comes in with that joyfulness that she brings and then you see how the kids love her, I'm absolutely.
n/a Ali- keeps a busy schedule. To make ends meet, she has another part time job working for her dad's medical supply business.
n/a She's a worker. She doesn't play around. She gets right to where she needs to get to. She knows what she needs to do. She comes in every day.
n/a She does a count on what we need. She comes in. She helps us. She pushes. You know?
n/a That's that's great.
n/a Yeah. Ali- helps package non sterile kits and components that go into operating emergency rooms across the country.
Ali- What do
n/a you think Ali- brings to the workplace?
n/a Well, it's she's a ray of sunshine to everybody she works with. Right. She changes the culture. Right. For sure.
n/a You know, diversity in the workforce in many different ways is good for the workforce. It's good for, you know, we've got a little company with 30 some employees here. They look forward to seeing her. Like she looks forward to seeing them and it's really not that different. Right.
n/a Ali- responsibilities don't end at work. She shares a rental house with a roommate. The 2 share chores from collecting eggs from backyard chickens
Ali- I got 2 eggs in my egg apron.
n/a To cleaning the house. These 2 roommates first met when Ali- was at college. Rebecca has tons of experience working with adults with intellectual disabilities.
n/a And then I finished my grad program and ended up moving to Hickory which is where she was from. When she moved back, her parents approached me and was like, what do you think about this arrangement?
Ali- So what kinds of things do you do
n/a with Allie? What what kinds of things do you help her with?
n/a Some of
n/a the biggest things, that I do with her now, are around meals and cooking, a little bit of daily YouTube, kinda hygiene things. I actually
Ali- want a peanut butter with bananas.
n/a Okay. So
n/a we do a meal plan together. Grocery shopping, we typically do that together.
Ali- Do do do do do sauce. There we go.
n/a And at the start of each and every month, Ali- has an important business meeting to attend.
n/a Oh my god.
n/a Ali- looks like you had plenty of extra this month in that category.
n/a I did really good. With her dad.
n/a Entertainment, you got 40 more dollars to put in that. So I
n/a just got
n/a that sticker on there for you.
Ali- That's not it's, I think, 80.
n/a $80 a month. Yes. Allie and I want to sit down and we just review her spending number right there. 562. Yeah.
n/a Okay. So this is a good method for us to check-in and she's making it, you know, she's making it and it's not like some pixie dust or anything hidden behind a curtain. I mean, she's, she's doing this because I'm not gonna live forever. You gotta keep doing this. Right.
n/a So How about that?
n/a From the time she was a baby, Ali- parents were carefully planning her financial future. This rental house, the landlords are actually Allie's parents.
n/a We obviously wanna advocate. We want people to know this is possible. We wanna be realistic.
Ali- It's not that rainbows and unicorns Yeah. As much as we wanted to all be rainbows and unicorns.
n/a You know, or she makes enough money
n/a to pay
n/a all her bills by herself.
n/a She does make enough to pay her bills. You know, with a roommate that helps split the rent up, you know, if you had to rent a house like this, it would probably be $1200, but we don't charge $1200 in rent for it. You know, if she were living in an apartment in Hickory, could she pay her own bills? She could. Wouldn't leave her a lot extra.
n/a Sure. Yeah. But she makes minimum wage at her school job, and she makes above minimum wage at PPI. She can pay her utilities and her rent, and her food.
n/a Which is fantastic. That's amazing. Yeah.
n/a So, it is possible and it's
n/a My goal for Ruby's lot of the and Kelly's goal for her daughter Nella is to be independent. And seeing what Ruby's life looks like, I couldn't help but wonder how far this could go. How independent can Ali- really be in the future? How independent could Ruby or Nella be in the future?
n/a A year and a half ago, I really we had to have a really raw, honest conversation with Ali- and myself and her parents because I felt like I was doing a lot, that her parents didn't realize I was doing. And so I was very frank with them. I was like, so what do you what's your ultimate goal for Allie? And Pam said, I want Ally to live on her own with no support. And as much as I love to be positive and focus on strengths and everything, I was like, can I share something with you?
n/a It's and this is probably gonna make me cry.
n/a But her her down syndrome stopped going away. I don't know why it makes me cry so much. Makes me cry. Like as much as I love Ali- and I wouldn't change anything about her, it's not going away. She's always gonna need a little bit of support here and there.
n/a And while that's awesome, like, I would love for her to be no support, but that's that's not really reality.
Ali- I think
n/a And that's Sorry.
n/a She's sitting here watching her roommate cry. And she's crying because that roommate is here and had those hard conversations because she loves her so much. She came up to me later and whispered, do you know why I was crying? It's because I was so happy. And we both have daughters with Down Syndrome, so we know what we know that there's a lot of things that you do that are that are harder.
n/a You work harder than anybody. I do.
Ali- But you do it with a big beautiful smile on your face, and I think that's what pushes us to drive hard and be better people. You're right, Liz. Completely.
n/a It just hits you as a mom. We all know what that feels Life. When we're fighting so hard and you you you stop and you ask yourself, what are you fighting for, you know. And so 1 thing I've loved about this trip is that we've gotten a lot of real answers. I don't want a glossy version.
n/a Give me the truth. What does it really look like? What are the hard things? Tell me the challenges. I will take the tears.
n/a I will take the pain. I will take the times where I think I don't know what to do and there's no answers. If I know that along with that, there gonna be nights outside with people you love and twinkle lights and making toasts and hugs and tears. That if I know I can have that, then I'll sign up for it all. And this is what it's all about.
n/a Everybody knows as we celebrate tonight and we laugh and we play games and we dance in the kitchen and drink wine, this is what it's all about in the end.
n/a I mean, it's amazing to just see the life that that she's living and know that someday that that's possible for my granddaughter. Thank you. I love you.