Jennifer Van Syckle 0:00 When a person has a disability, whether it be intellectual, physical or other, it doesn't mean they have to live in a small world. Special Olympics can open some amazing doors. We're going to rejoin our guests, Stacey, as she talks about her incredible experiences. Thank you for joining us for this episode of Talking health in the 406, where we're one community under the Big Sky. I'm your host, Jennifer Van Syckle, longtime health care worker, third health educator. Stacey did want to ask you you identify as a person with a disability. I was wondering if you could talk more about that about what what that is. So I have an intellectual disability. I have fetal alcohol syndrome. And so I have an intellectual disability. So things are harder for me to learn. I see. And that was must be how you got into Special Olympics originally. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah, because it's a great program. And it's such a vast, diverse group of people that can participate in Special Olympics in you've had a pretty cool experience. I'm wondering if you could tell us about, tell us about your Special Olympics time and maybe some of the fun things that you've got to do with that. All right. So in Special Olympics, I got started in Special Olympics back in 1985. I was in high school, and yeah, I started just participating as an athlete, and then I was what they call the ALPS athlete leadership program. And so we did speeches and stuff to for the program. And then I was one of the first Sargeant Shriver Global Messengers, international Global Messengers. There was 12 of us from around the world. And Sargeant Shriver is Eunice Kennedy Shriver who Eunice Kennedy Shriver was the founding founder of Special Olympics. She was JFK's sister, they had a sister, Rosemary who is intellectually disabled. And so she started the program for people with intellectual disability to play sports. And Sargeant Shriver, it was her husband. And he started he, they had 12 athletes, that would be the international Global Messengers. And so we I was one of the first 12 And we got to go around the world actually, to speak on behalf of the Special Olympic athletes. I got to go to China. She's I've been to about, Stacey Johnston Gleason 2:51 I'd say about 12 Different countries on behalf of Special Olympics. Wow. Yeah. And a lot of that was because I was on the international board of directors. And also, I was on the sports Rules Committee. And right now I'm on the golf committee, International Golf committee. And so I help out with the golf rules. Yeah, Mom, I'm also a golfer on the golf. Jennifer Van Syckle 3:19 I do a golf rules like I am, uh, sorry. No, you're good. Do you kind of help make up the rules and regulations that will be happening with Special Olympics around? Well? Yeah, Stacey Johnston Gleason 3:36 we help out with that we do we do the golf rolls. I also am a rules official for golf. Jennifer Van Syckle 3:43 Okay, Special Olympics. Special Olympics Stacey Johnston Gleason 3:47 us games. I go to those and help out with the rules on the course. Jennifer Van Syckle 3:53 Nice. I know in your experience with Special Olympics and traveling, you get to meet some at least one famous person. I was wondering if you could share. Oh, Stacey Johnston Gleason 4:08 I've met some pretty incredible people. Jennifer Van Syckle 4:10 Ah, gotta share it. Well, yeah. We met Movie Masters. Stacey Johnston Gleason 4:14 I've met a couple of the Presidents I've met. Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Nelson Mandela, Yao Ming, yeah, I've met. I've met so many incredible people. I can't even name them all. It's it's been. It's been great. And I'm good friends with Bart Conner and Nadia Comaneci each. Yeah, they're good friends of mine. Okay, who are they? I'm afraid I don't know. You don't you don't know Bart Conner and Nadia Comaneci Jennifer Van Syckle 4:43 I don't think I do. Maybe I do. They're great gymnasts. Stacey Johnston Gleason 4:48 Oh, okay. From so Nadia is the first one to ever get a 10 Jennifer Van Syckle 4:56 Okay, okay. Okay. Yeah. Stacey Johnston Gleason 4:59 And Bart is one of the most famous US Men's gymnasts. Jennifer Van Syckle 5:06 Ah, okay. Okay. I see. I see. Thank you for that. Yeah, Stacey Johnston Gleason 5:12 they're there. They're married. Now, Nadia is from Romania. Okay, they're they live in the US now. And they're, they're married. Okay. They're they're good supporters of Special Olympics. Jennifer Van Syckle 5:28 Fabulous. Yeah. And the year you got to have dinner once at a really cool place in the United States. Oh, the White Stacey Johnston Gleason 5:34 House. Yeah, I've been I've actually had dinner at the White House. Three times. I think what? Oh, yeah. It's amazing. Yeah. Yeah, three times, I think. Wow. Jennifer Van Syckle 5:47 Stacey that's amazing. That's, I mean, I think you take six people and put them together. And I don't know if they would have as many experiences as you did with with Special Olympics there. Stacey Johnston Gleason 5:58 Yeah, I did get the Spirit Award for Special Olympics. It's the number one award. That's the top award for Special Olympics that you can get. Wow. Um, I got it with 12 other people in one of the other people was Nelson Mandela. Jennifer Van Syckle 6:15 Wow. That's amazing. It's hanging in my house, awesome, as it should be, as it should be. Stacey, when you got like that award, and when you get to meet all those famous people and traveled all those countries, had you put your name and a hat to be entered into some sort of competition for that or did? Stacey Johnston Gleason 6:34 No, no, it was. It was I'm not actually sure how I got it. I was actually competing and golf in China. And they said, You got to come to this meeting. And I said, Well, I'm competing. So I can't come to any of the meetings. Because I was on the board. And they said, Well, you got to come to at least this one. And I said, All right, one meeting. That's all I'm coming to. And they said, Okay, it's an awards meeting. It's an awards banquet. And I said, okay, and I get there. And Mrs. Shriver said, Oh, there's the award winner. And I'm thinking to myself, we haven't even finished competition yet. You know, so I wasn't sure what she was talking about. And we get done. And Colin Farrell was there and everything. Yeah. And all of a sudden, were this. We get we get done with all the pre meet pre, Unknown Speaker 7:33 you know, what do you call those? Stacey Johnston Gleason 7:35 hors d'oeuvres and all that, you know, and we sit down in the theater, and my name is called. They call me up there to get this award. And so it was pretty much it was pretty surprising. Yeah. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, I have. I was with uh, let's see the ones on the. Let's see. Yoa Ming got it. Vanessa Williams. Nelson Mandela, me. Yeah. I was the only Special Olympics athlete that got it. Oh, okay. Jennifer Van Syckle 8:09 Yeah, you're you're listing off some big names there, Stacey. That's great. Wow. That's pretty incredible. That's cool. That's That's good. That's an it's great that to know that an athlete got that too. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's pretty, pretty cool. Yeah, yeah. Well, it's amazing. To us forget to mention that. That's all right. That's all right. That's cool. That's awesome. What doors Special Olympics, you know, I think, I don't know. You know, if somebody in your life has a disability, it doesn't mean all the doors are shut and they need to live in a small world. They can Special Olympics and other great programs offered. Out there can oh yeah, gosh, just really? Yeah. expand the horizons for sure. Stacey Johnston Gleason 9:02 When I got the award, they said, I said, when I started Special Olympics, I started my life. That's a very cool way to put it. So that's pretty much what happened. Jennifer Van Syckle 9:21 I'm glad to hear you're still involved with it with the golf. Yeah, it's pretty cool. So if somebody's listening to this, and they have a family member with a disability, do you know is there criteria or a acceptance process to get into Special Olympics? How does one even go about getting into special and starting with Special Olympics? Stacey Johnston Gleason 9:47 Well, you have to have an intellectual disability or similar a disability. So yeah, there's a there's a medical form that you do have to have that you have to fill out, have filled out. So every three years, I have to have one filled out. They're good for three years. And it's everybody has to have one. For every state for every, every three years, every athlete for every state has to have one. You get one of those, you have your doctor fill it, you fill out half of it and your doctor fills out one page of it. You turn it in, and that's how you get started. Jennifer Van Syckle 10:28 Okay, perfect. And we can sure put a link for Special Olympics on to our site. Yeah, the Talkinghealthinthe406.mt.gov. Stacey Johnston Gleason 10:38 Yes. SOMT.org Jennifer Van Syckle 10:40 Okay, SOMT.org That's a good one. We can do that. And it's everywhere in Montana, right? Do you know Stacey Johnston Gleason 10:48 because? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Should be pretty much everywhere. Yeah. Okay. Jennifer Van Syckle 10:53 says can you tell us about some of the sports you did in Special Olympics? I know. You mentioned the golf, being and all that. But what else have you dove into with with Special Olympics? Stacey Johnston Gleason 11:05 So I've done 18 different sports and Special Olympics. Wow. Montana doesn't do nearly as many sports as well like Washington, like I've done in Washington and stuff. But I've done like sports that I have that don't they don't do here. Like speed skating, like speed ice skating, speed roller skating, volleyball, those sports that that I did in Washington. You don't do here. So I've done and I did. Team handball. Yeah, I've done so many sports. Over the years. Yeah. Okay. Jennifer Van Syckle 11:39 And I could see, yeah, we're based on population and even even location where if you're in Louisiana, you might not have speedskating as an option. But you might have something else. And I could see where that could, could definitely vary. I think that's something that a lot Stacey, I know, we, we got to meet you through some colleagues here at work. And they tell me that you're a disability disability advisor. So I'm gonna if you could tell me what that is, and what you, you do Stacey Johnston Gleason 12:12 in that role? So my disability advisor for the Cancer Coalition, steering committee and steering committee, and what I do is I, I go to the meetings for the steering committee, especially and I help out by going to the meetings and letting them know if they're missing anything about including people with disabilities. That's interesting. Jennifer Van Syckle 12:39 And I'm curious, you know, nobody ever does it intentionally. But what are some of the things you've seen just in your life where people might not have been included as much as they should? Like people with disabilities? Or can you think of any examples? Well, Stacey Johnston Gleason 12:55 I don't know if it's as much as not including, as in, I'm not sure how to word it as in ruining, Jennifer Van Syckle 13:05 or maybe even overlooking, we had a one of our other podcast guests, is a person who's blind. And he was telling us about how, you know, he goes into some buildings, and there should be a sign next to every door in Braille that tells you what's behind that doorway. And that it's been surprising the places where those little signs aren't, and I could see something like that maybe. Yeah, as well, where it's totally not intentional. Totally not, not meant to be excluded, just kind of a unawareness, or Yeah, yeah. Stacey Johnston Gleason 13:44 Or are they? Or I see it one way. And it's like, oh, I never thought of it that way. Yeah. Because I see it one way. And then they're like, Oh, well, it never occurred to me that it could be that way. You know, it's bringing it from a different point of view. I think they they don't see it from the same view we do. So it's like, yeah, you got to bring it to a Yeah. Jennifer Van Syckle 14:15 Yeah, that makes sense. That definitely, definitely makes sense. Oh, and any challenges with your healthcare with accessing your healthcare? I know, at one point you mentioned, do you have to travel four hours to see a doctor? Stacey Johnston Gleason 14:32 That's my primary care? And that's because, yeah, that's because of I trust her and just finding somebody that you trust that much. Yeah. And who respects you and you feel that comfortable with. Now I'm going to have to find that again. And it's just, of course, I'm going to try to find it a little closer than four hours. But Jennifer Van Syckle 15:00 Right, right. It's, it's just Stacey Johnston Gleason 15:03 how do you even begin? You know? Jennifer Van Syckle 15:06 Oh, it's it's huge. Yeah. And it's interesting because people with disabilities are more likely to have a personal doctor than someone without. And so it's, you know, I kind of get to think that they may be more so than most a person with disabilities realizes the importance of having that primary care doctor and getting the checkups and, you know, not neglecting that part of themselves. Stacey Johnston Gleason 15:31 Yeah. And how it's somebody that's not going to just take it for granted that you just, you're just not going to, I don't know, just be able to, you know, know what to say. Right. Jennifer Van Syckle 15:46 Ya know, or know that something, Stacey Johnston Gleason 15:48 know that something's not right, you know, Unknown Speaker 15:53 without asking assumptions. Jennifer Van Syckle 15:53 Yeah. Yeah. That's somebody that can talk to you and talk you through things to get to answers instead of Yeah, yeah. Cutting going assuming it. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. It's. So it's kind of Stacey Johnston Gleason 16:11 kind of scary, trying to be, you know, thinking about having to figure that out again. Jennifer Van Syckle 16:16 I bet. So, no, well, this has been great Stacey. And we definitely appreciate you sharing your story and your experiences both. I mean, gosh, between cancer, pulmonary embolisms, Special Olympics, you've got a lot of great experiences and stories to share. And I'm glad you're you're doing that as a disability advisor with the Cancer Coalition. And yeah, you're contributing, you're contributing big time to the world, which is awesome. It's very, very awesome. Thank you so much to Stacey for joining us today and for sharing her awesome experiences with Special Olympics and more. If you would like more information on Special Olympics and other activities and resources provided today, visit our website at TalkingHealthinthe406.mt.gov. And thank you for joining us for another episode of Talking Health in the 406 where we're one community under the Big Sky. Until next time, take care. Transcribed by https://otter.ai