A 1-year-old boy has the best reaction when he spots a stranger with the same limb difference as him.
The reason kids can say the darnedest things is because sometimes they are pretty observant.
Case in point, this young boy, Joseph Tidd. Though it wasn’t what he said, but what he did that was heartwarming. He was born with a congenital condition - he is missing a fully formed left arm.
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He’s not alone in this birth defect, as he quickly discovered.
This all started on the day Joseph’s mother, Colleen Tidd, found out he would be born with his difference. Miraculously, she stumbled upon a group called the Lucky Fin Project.
This group consists of a collection of individuals who also have limb differences.
Since the discovery Colleen has reached out to the organization for support with Joseph who is now 15 months old.
She shared, “I found their website and Facebook page and it just brought this sense of comfort...I realized, ‘Hey, I have a community here.”
As Colleen built her relationship with the group she learned that many of the members had never actually met in person. In response, she organized a time for members to meet up in October. The location was near her home in Orlando.
Almost a dozen families were in attendance.
“It was just a great sense of comfort, not only for Joseph but for us as a family, to see everyone else in person...And we wanted to show Joseph that, hey, he will be able to do anything.”
During the meet-up is when Joseph had his chance to meet someone who is just like him. Amy Alamillo Siesel, who is 34, was born with a defect in her right arm leaving it underdeveloped.
Amy shared this, “I was bullied quite a bit and constantly inundated with questions about my arm...I struggled with insecurity. As I became an adult, however, I gained a newfound confidence in who I felt God made me to be. I began to embrace my limb difference and love the lessons it taught me, hard as some of them were.”
Amy was able to share love with Joseph during their encounter when she embraced him with a warm hug. He happily obliged with an embrace of his own.
“He wasn’t feeling well that day and he didn’t want anyone to touch them the whole time, until he fist-bumped with Amy and realized like, ‘Wow, she looks like me,’” Colleen shared after the meeting. “This meetup was originally more for me than it was for him since he’s so young, but for him to have realized that he has someone that’s like him — it just hit. It was comforting.”
Colleen has started early in reaffirming her son that despite being born differently than most, he has just as much value as everyone else. A limb difference doesn’t change that truth.
“Everyone’s unique. It doesn’t make them different. Because he’s got a disability or deformity, it doesn’t mean he’s not going to be able to do everything...There are people out here in the world that, even if they have a difference, nothing’s going to stop them because they’re just going to find a different way to do it.”
Her words are very inspiring. Some of us are born with missing body parts, conditions, diseases. Yet, may we thank God first and foremost for being born at all. And may we praise him for giving us people in life who can relate to us either through a personal understanding or simply caring about our unique situations.
No one is born “perfect,” but we can all be perfect in Christ.
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“My flesh was made by you, and my parts joined together in my mother's body.” Psalm 139:13
h/t: People
Featured Image Credit: Facebook
Get in touch with him at aarondanthony.com and check out his debut short story anthology Honey Dreams on Amazon and Barnes and Noble.