02.04.2011

Speech by Rebeka Jankovska Risteski – World Autism Awareness Day, April 2nd

Dear ladies and gentleman,

I stand before you as a parent of a child with a rare disease, but also as an active participant in the fight for a better future for all children with special needs, not just those who are autistic.

For all of us, parents of children with special needs, the road on which we and our children will walk is clear, but we are gathered here today to remind the community to open the arms for our children, we must not just silently shook the head to when we see such a child.

For most of the diseases and syndromes that cause disability, unfortunately there is still no so-called gold standard for treatment, a therapeutic method that is sovereign, even though we can see great medical progress. Until a decade ago we thought that once damaged nerve tissue can no longer regenerate, we thought synaptogenesis ends before the school age of the children and thought that mental retardation is a definitive and irreversible process.

I know that most parents present here today are making a daily struggle and search for a new drug, new treatment. Hope is growing every day, but we must turn to those parents who have lost hope for a better tomorrow for their children. We can restore hope with warmth and sharing of experiences and knowledge. We can integrate all of our associations with the same imperative with larger, more experienced national and international associations, so information will travel faster, experiences will be exchanged more intensively, and we can actively participate in collecting funds for clinical trials.

I want to remind the community, I want to remind you, to increase your social solidarity allowing inclusion of these children in education. I appeal to all state institutions and companies to increase their social responsibility, not only to make random and rare activities related to their social responsibility and in the name of their own marketing. .
When certain people set out on their way without thinking or concern for the rest of the world, then dissent and chaos appear. When your heart beats and you work for the best of all of us who are different, special, only the best can happen.

I thank you and hope that next year, on this day we will be able to share more beautiful experiences.

Give us wings!