"Mom, I am a real world champion, I am a Chinese Special Olympics athlete!" For a child with Down syndrome, this is one of the few highlights in his life.

"Xiang Li from China!" On the podium of the 2015 Los Angeles Summer Special Olympics Games, Li Xiang, a special Olympic athlete from China, will never forget this sentence in his ears for life. In his first world competition, he won 1 gold, 2 silver and 2 copper in the gymnastics event. "Mom, I am a real world champion, I am a Chinese Special Olympics athlete!"

For a child with Down syndrome, this is one of the few highlights in his life. Under the podium, her mother Yang Jianying had already cried. Since her child was born in 2003, she has been fighting against the cruel fate with him and finally embarking on the road to Special Olympics. "I tell myself that I must train him well."

champion and his mother have won the first round, but this battle of fate continues.

Even if you sell a house

Yang Jianying's war began one month after his son's full moon wine ended. It was the winter of 2003. She was 25 years old. When she was in confinement, she noticed something strange at home: the joy of welcoming a new life briefly appeared and disappeared, her family became silent day by day, and the atmosphere became deeper and deeper day by day, without any explanation, only a tacit understanding.

"Did you hide something from me?" The young mother couldn't help asking. With the wife's constant begging, the husband had to tell the truth: their child, who was only two months old, had been diagnosed with a patient with Down syndrome, commonly known as "Tang Baobao".

This is the first time Yang Jianying heard this strange word, and she didn't even realize that this was the name of a disease. She instinctively comforted herself: "As long as medical technology can solve it, it is not a disease. She is willing to spend much money, even if she sells a house."

But, this is indeed not a disease that can be cured by spending money. Down syndrome, also known as trisomy syndrome, is a genetic disease caused by trisomy of chromosome 21. Common symptoms include developmental delay, different facial features, and mild to moderate intellectual disabilities. Young people with this disease have IQs that are about 8-9 years old.

In 2012, the "China Birth Defect Prevention and Control Report" released by the former Ministry of Health showed that the incidence of Down syndrome in my country was about 147/000, which means that on average, there is one Down syndrome patient in every 680 people. According to estimates, the number of new Down syndrome in my country each year is 23,000 to 25,000.

Yang Jianying, who knows nothing about this disease, searched for all information about this disease on the Internet, and almost all the negative information presented to her eyes. "Deaf, dumb, blind and paralyzed", at that moment, she felt "five thunderstorms" and "it was difficult to associate the search results with the child in front of her."

"I really didn't see any problems with the child at that time. I had to say that it was different, but it was quieter than other children." A long time later, Yang Jianying realized that there were some unusual signs on the child at that time. For example, when feeding breast milk and milk powder, the child did not cry too much, and did not have a good sucking function, and he ate less and took less time. He would often eat less and more meals, and often could not sleep in order to feed the child at night.

Li Xiang and his mother Yang Jianying

As a genetic disease, Down syndrome cannot be cured. After accepting the reality, the couple named the child "Li Xiang", hoping that he can still embrace his ideals when facing a cruel life.

Li Xiang has a lower cognitive ability than healthy children of the same age. For example, for water, fire or thorny things, he will only realize the danger after feeling it personally. When they were childhood, the couple set up a fish tank at home, hoping that their little life would leave some pleasant memories for Li Xiang's childhood. Unexpectedly, seeing the fish swimming, Li Xiang waved his hand and smashed the fish tank, and the glass slag and water flowed all over the floor.

"How did I raise him and how did I become a qualified parent?" Yang Jianying felt real despair surged over. She realized that she could not blame the child, and that she needed to reflect on herself, "Because as a parent, I didn't tell him what to do in advance." After the fish tank incident, the couple put a pot of cactus in the room. Yang Jianying held Li Xiang's hand and touched it gently, allowing him to feel the feeling of being stabbed within a controllable range. She told Li Xiang: "This is a plant that helps us purify the air, but you can't touch it easily because it has thorns."

Later, every time I passed by this pot of cactus, Li Xiang would keep a certain distance. "He can understand." Yang Jianying strengthened his thoughts: treat him as an ordinary child and communicate with frankly and patiently. "Sometimes he may not be able to give a clear feedback, but I believe that the amount of it will be accumulated."

because he loves him too much

and the war between fate has begun, but how can you truly treat Tang Baobao as an ordinary child? Yang Jianying adheres to the concept of trust and harming health and inclusiveness. She sent Li Xiang to an ordinary kindergarten. From the age of 4 to 7, he ate, studied, sleeped and lived with healthy children.

In the kindergarten, without the guidance of parents and the special care of teachers, Li Xiang must tie his own shoelaces and wear clothes. In order to cultivate his life skills, Yang Jianying developed many training activities. For example, after returning home from school every day, she would give Li Xiang a piece of cloth with large and small buttons, and train the buttons and finally master it after hundreds of repetitions.

No parent of Tang Baobao is willing to be treated specially. After graduating from the kindergarten, Yang Jianying sent Li Xiang to an ordinary primary school, "I want to try whether this road can be done."

In class, Li Xiang's logical and abstract thinking was very poor, and he had no idea about mathematics and English classes. He couldn't sit still in class and often had to go to the teacher's office to make up for extra lessons. In school, the eyes and comments of children of the same age around them are also inevitable. "At the beginning, the children might think that Li Xiang is naughty and he is not good at studying, but they just think that he is a poor student. Gradually, the word "bad student" in the children's mouth is no longer just the word "bad student"," said Yang Jianying.

In ordinary schools, Yang Jianying also needs to master the art of taking care of Li Xiang's self-esteem. If the school has group activities such as checking radio exercises or visiting brother schools, the teacher will tell Yang Jianying in advance that the implication is that he does not want Li Xiang to appear with other children, because his actions are different from other children and look weird.

2015, Li Xiang participated in the gymnastics competition of the Los Angeles Summer Olympics in the United States

Yang Jianying understood and had to keep Li Xiang at home and take sick leave the next day. But in order to take into account the child's feelings, she will adopt a more wise approach. Sometimes, she asks Li Xiang: "There will be an exam in the school tomorrow. Do you want to go?" "No." "Then will we study at home?"

fusion of cancer and Jianjian is not that simple. In the second grade, Li Xiang transferred to the Pudong New District auxiliary school. Among his classmates were children with Down syndrome, children with developmental delays, children with autism, and some children with memory loss. Li Xiang is the youngest in the class. Because the school is far away from home, he has to get up every morning and have to sleep in the bus to the school. He often goes into the classroom with a blanket.

Because Li Xiang does his own way, the faculty and staff in the school know him. Fortunately, the teachers in the school have enough patience. A set of pinyin can be taught in ordinary schools in three to five minutes. In the auxiliary school, they can teach for a week. When they are middle-aged and middle-aged, the school will arrange to teach practical life skills such as washing dishes and clothes, and teach children to understand the operation methods of washing machines, refrigerators and microwaves.

"We can't accompany him for the rest of our lives." In order to make Li Xiang develop good living habits, at home, Yang Jianying insisted on letting Li Xiang do it by himself. Sometimes grandparents felt distressed: "He is still young, and it's time to learn when he grows up." Yang Jianying is often the strict character: "None of you can help him." "I do this not because I don't love him, but because I love him too much."

family members try to correct Li Xiang's habits every day, but their progress is very slow, and speaking has become the most difficult hurdle.Because Tang Baobao's tongue is wide and his pronunciation is not standard, at the beginning, only his family could understand Li Xiang's words. Since he was very young, Yang Jianying gave Li Xiang oral training, personally demonstrating the position of his tongue, teeth and lips to ensure that "every word must be pronounced clearly." For example, expressing the meaning of eating, Li Xiang only knew how to use his fingers at first, but later he would say "change", which slowly turned into "farm". Finally, he learned to say "rice". Yang Jianying recorded the pronunciation for Li Xiang to let him feel his progress.

"Win this war against fate, firm belief is the most important." Yang Jianying claims to be a strong person. In the workplace, she spent 10 years from the bottom to the current position of director of the state-owned enterprise office. "I have always gained these through my own studies. I think human potential is unlimited. I firmly believe that children can live the life they deserve."

I am also sticking to

The auxiliary school in Pudong New District where Li Xiang is located is a special school featuring the Special Olympics sports. In 2014, a gymnastics selection by the school allowed Yang Jianying to see more possibilities. At that time, considering that Li Xiang was well-proportioned and had good flexibility, the coach thought he was a good seedling for gymnastics.

is related to future development, and Yang Jianying feels that we should respect the children's wishes. After a period of trial, she and Li Xiang had a serious communication: "You can give up now. If you decide, you must persist. Have you thought about it?" Li Xiang replied: "I like it very much, I want to continue practicing." After

basic movements, the intensity and difficulty of training gradually increased. Every day when you go home from school, Li Xiang has to do flexibility, endurance and balance training. Tang Baobao has poor balance. At first, Li Xiang could only stand against the wall, his body could not stop shaking, and slowly could stand on one foot, and finally stand off the wall.

In order to better guide the child, Yang Jianying became half a coach herself. She taught herself gymnastics, decomposed movements, mastered the essentials of movements and the entire process. She also asked the teacher to shoot the standard movement videos for her.

By chance, the school invited Li Xiaopeng, the world champion of men's gymnastics, to visit, and Li Xiang volunteered to perform a pommel horse action. At that time, Li Xiang's strength was not good, and he only supported it with the help of Li Xiaopeng, but he was very happy. After returning home, he said to his mother: "I also want to train hard and participate in the world competition."

Because of training, Li Xiang's hands blistered and grinded a layer of cocoon

More than a year of training did not waste in vain. At the end of 2014, the coach told Yang Jianying that Li Xiang was selected for the national team. After half a year of training, he will represent China in the summer special Olympic gymnastics competition held in Los Angeles, USA in July 2015, participating in 6 individual events. At that time, there were more than 100 players in the national team. The 11-year-old Li Xiang was the youngest among them. After

enters the training state, the training intensity further increases. Regardless of the wind or rain, Li Xiang had to get up on time at 6 o'clock every day, train for 6-8 hours during the day, and after the end of 4 o'clock in the evening, he had to train for one more hour than other children. In order to spend more time with your children, in June, Yang Jianying quit her job in a state-owned enterprise to take care of her children's training life full-time.

training is hard for ordinary people to imagine. At that time, it was the hot summer season, and there was no air conditioner in the gymnastics room, and the children often sweated profusely. "At that time, I watched him rotate on six events. He could not do anything except hand over a glass of water, but if he wanted to do something, he had to pay. The child was persevering, and I was persevering too."

Because the gymnastics event needed to grab the bar, Li Xiang had a layer of blisters on his hand. In order not to affect the training, he could only pick it one by one, and slowly a thick layer of cocoon grew. "He doesn't say it hurts, he has the energy to win the world championship." Yang Jianying said that on the gymnastics bar, she saw a different Li Xiang, which was a kind of thrilling spirit that she had never seen before.

I want to be you

At the Los Angeles Summer Olympics, 12-year-old Li Xiang won the first gold medal in his life, which also made Yang Jianying realize that firmness will be rewarded. From the moment she saw her son cheering up on the podium, she knew that the journey there will be infinite possibilities.

Inspired by the spirit of equality, acceptance and tolerance, Li Xiang has since participated in many competitions such as dryland ice hockey, special Olympic football, roller skating, and speed skating, and has achieved remarkable results, and of course it has also caused injuries. Especially for roller skating, because you have to wrap your ankles tightly, your ankles will swollen high after each exercise, so now you have left sequelae. You have to wear ankle protection every time, and you will not take them off even if the weather is hot.

In fact, Yang Jianying knew in his heart that the gold medal in Los Angeles was not very valuable, and the strength of a 12-year-old child was not strong enough. In the ring event, Li Xiang just pulled it for a while and ended. But Yang Jianying believes that children identify themselves as world champions, which is an extremely powerful spiritual pillar. "In the future, if you encounter difficulties and setbacks, this gold medal will continue to motivate him to go on."

In 2017, Li Xiang participated in the short track speed skating event of the Winter Special Olympics. The Shanghai team, which was formed for the first time, formed a national team of four provincial teams, Sichuan, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. When conducting intensive training on the ice, due to the speed too fast, Li Xiang accidentally fell out while rubbing the ice surface, and his chin hit the knife-like ice surface, blood flowed all over the ground, leaving an indelible scar on his chin.

Afterwards, the coach told Yang Jianying a detail that when people carried Li Xiang off the venue, the first thing he said was: "Don't tell my mother about my injury, I'm afraid she will be sad." Yang Jianying said that at that moment, she realized that her child had grown up. He understood what love is and how to repay love.

At the 2019 Abu Dhabi World Summer Special Olympics, Li Xiaopeng presented Li Xiang with awards

The support and feedback from the outside also gave the mother and son the courage to continue fighting. In March 2019, Lee Xiang participated in the gymnastics event of the 15th World Summer Special Olympics held in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the UAE, and harvested 2 gold, 4 silver and 1 bronze. During the award ceremony, the Chinese team selected Li Xiang as a member of the team to enter the field with Li Xiaopeng.

Afterwards, Yang Jianying learned that before the award ceremony began, Li Xiang wrote a crooked line of words in a hotel room with a pencil on a sticky note: Hello Brother Xiaopeng, my name is Li Xiang, I am a special Olympic (athlete). I like you very much and like gymnastics. I want to work hard to become the world champion like you.

When entering the court, Li Xiang secretly stuffed the piece of paper into Li Xiaopeng's hand, touching the world champion, and personally putting a gold medal on him and giving him a big hug. Li Xiaopeng said: "Thanks to sports for letting us go together. I have always held his hand and hope I can bring him more strength."

Over the years, Yang Jianying has been particularly willing to stand in front of the media and convey his ideas to the public: having Tang Baby does not mean a disaster for the family. As long as you master the wise education method, children can also have a better life. On July 20 this year, at the 15th "National Special Olympic Day" event held by the Shanghai Disabled Persons' Federation, Yang Jianying shared his philosophy with more than 20,000 online audiences: "Chering is not about asking for rewards, but about a mutual nourishment. Whether he is beautiful or ugly, smart or stupid. Surround him with love, warm him, cultivate him with wisdom, and achieve him. Through understanding, then recognize him, and finally reach recognition."

Once, Yang Jianying asked Li Xiang what kind of life he would like to live in the future? What kind of person do you want to be? Li Xiang said: "I want to be like you, I want to be you."

Jiefang Daily·Shangguan News original article, please indicate

reprinting author: Gu Jie

Source: Jiefang Daily