I grew up in a family that normalized disabilities. In a culture that his children who were disabled, I had a sister with developmental disabilities who had grown up in our household and who was as valued as anyone with a higher functioning intellect. I went to the programs she was in through the Regional Center as I was growing up and met her friends with various disabilities. I loved the parties and dinners. So it is probably no shock to anyone when I realized I wanted to reach and realized that my strength lay in special education. Not only did I enjoy focusing on teaching reading intervention classes, I taught them for five years at a school for kids with behavior and emotional disabilities. Most of these kids had been deemed too aggressive to be in public schools around the Bay Area. I loved working with the kids 1:1 to reach them reading strategies. The school also directly taught and modeled behavior strategies for managing anger and frustration. It helped change lives.