Antonia Roybal-Mack, Legislative Committee Chair

At 6:00 am on Sunday morning, most parents would want to roll the other way when their child comes to their bedside and says, “wake up Mama”  “pancakes” and follows with an affectionate “I love you.”  However, that experience is very different for a PEI parent that was told that their child would never hear or speak.  I was concerned when my daughter was diagnosed with Down Syndrome.  I was devastated when she was diagnosed as deaf.   I didn’t have a meaning to attach to Down Syndrome, but I had a clear understanding of what it means to hear and speak.  My family struggled with the diagnosis of hearing loss, as we could not communicate with Lea, were not successful in learning sign language while caring for an infant and simply lived with frustration as we tried to navigate this experience.  Then we found PEI and they took a chance on our little girl, which changed her life and the lives of everyone she meets.  When I learned that PEI was out of reach for families without resources, I made it my personal mission to change that circumstance.  Every mother in New Mexico should hear her child say “I love you” and ask for pancakes in spoken language if that is the desire for her child.  If PEI was not in Lea’s life, she would have had very different outcomes in her social development, connection with family and ability to learn in school.   I am on this board, because we literally need to stand up for children with no voice.