Member Stories

Hearing Rachel’s story and how she wanted to impact the world has saved me. I’m a transgendered student who’s barely accepted by people and has been bullied my entire life. I was ready to take my life. I had a knife and pills all ready for me that night. But after hearing Rachel’s story, it gave me hope.

I have been going through a lot in my life, I have been the new girl in school countless times because of how many times I’ve moved. I have social anxiety, and so making new friends has not been easy.

My name is S. All my life I have not been the smallest kid. Instead I have been bullied for my weight, height, musical interest, and my life style. Other students would beat me up, exclude me and pretend I was invisible, and laugh at me non stop. I got used to this as my everyday life.

I am a 28-year old, middle sister of three, macramé making, fun-times-having-galore female currently kicking cancer’s butt! I love any and all festivals, dogs, holiday sweaters, and my family.

Baby Elijah was only seven weeks old when he was diagnosed with a rare childhood cancer, Retinoblastoma, cancer of the eye. His parents made the gut-wrenching decision to remove his eye in order to save his life. “We made this difficult decision hoping it might be our last step on the road of cancer treatment,” said his mom, Lisa.

Life was proceeding normally for Carter and his family until his mother, Maria, found a golf ball-sized lump in her son’s neck. After rushing him to the doctor, eight year-old Carter was diagnosed leukemia. “We knew everything was going to change and we were scared,” said Maria.

When her 14-year old daughter, Alexis, complained of recurring headaches and some loss of vision, her mom, Kimberly, knew something was very wrong. After a series of MRIs, she received the news that no parent should have to hear – her daughter had a brain tumor. It took 12 hours of surgery to remove the tumor and then Alexis underwent an additional seven weeks of radiation, followed with multiple rounds of chemotherapy.

In 2016, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention accomplished the following in our efforts to save lives and bring hope to those affected by suicide:

Rebecca Bridges juggles multiple roles: she is a professional, a wife and mother. Her husband, Eric, is the Executive Director of the American Council of the Blind. She speaks to us about how ACB is making a real impact on the everyday lives of American families.

Sarah Harris received the American Council of the Blind’s 2017 JPMorgan Chase Leadership Fellow Award in July at the ACB National Convention. She was excited to be attending her first ACB convention, and welcomed the opportunity to take her leadership skills to the next level.