Ann Marie makes it through life, school

When Ann Marie Griffith gets hold of the control stick on her sleek red scooter, all she needs is an open sidewalk to get anywhere on the Southern Miss campus.

It wasn't always so easy. Griffith, 33, was born with defects that affected her physical appearance as well as her speech. At first glance, she seems a fragile china doll who might topple and break under the weight of her pink backpack.

But those who know Griffith say she's as tough as she is determined. And Griffith said growing up with disabilities may have sidelined her from time to time, but it didn't make her sit back and wait for things to happen. Instead, she said, it made her push harder.

"I know a lot of people might imagine that growing up this way was hard for me, but I really didn't go through a lot of issues with it. I've always been mainstreamed in regular schools," said Griffith.

She was born with Aglossia-Adactylia syndrome, which meant she only had about one-third of her tongue. Those affected by the syndrome are also often missing limbs or fingers.

"I was also born with something known as Moebius syndrome, which is a rare neurological disorder affecting the sixth and seventh cranial nerves," Griffith said. This disease usually leaves a person unable to move their eyes laterally, and not able to move their face, smile or wink, she said.

The disorders robbed Griffith of uninhibited communication and the ability to easily move around. Some surgeries she had during her earlier years made her physical disabilities less of a problem.

But physical impairments didn't affect her mind, as her parents found when they placed her in a school at age 3 for disabled and mentally challenged children. Because her parents quickly realized the school would not challenge their youngest child, they moved her to "regular school," Griffith said.

Laura Akers remembers meeting Griffith when the two were very young.

"Due to the amazing innocence of children, I never saw her as different," Akers said. "She, for the most part, could do everything I could. Many things she did better."

She attended private schools in her native Shreveport, La., until she graduated high school in 1995. That same year, Griffith began working on a plan to gain her college degree.

"College was a pretty difficult transition for me. I still lived with my parents and depended on my mom for pretty much everything. I was pretty much undecided about what I wanted to do at that point," she said.

Griffith began college at Centenary College in Shreveport in 1995, left in 1999 and transferred to Louisiana State University-Shreveport. She was at LSU-Shreveport when her mother was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2000.

"Needless to say, I was a little overwhelmed by all this and ended up dropping out altogether," Griffith said.

For six years, Griffith stayed away from the classroom. Her mother died in 2004 and, devastated, Griffith could not seem to get her bearings. She became addicted to both alcohol and the pain pills she took following her corrective surgeries in the time following her mother's death and fell into a slow downward spiral.

"There are some people who just fall into addiction because of circumstances of being an alcoholic. But I think for me I was born into it because it runs through my family," Griffith said.

She spent some time at the Women's Center in Hattiesburg to begin her road back to sobriety.

"When I first met Ann at the Women's Center, she was scared and horrified," said Cannon Sublette, 29, of Memphis, one of Griffith's close friends. The two worked through their demons together in rehab.

"I never told her, but she's been a big inspiration to me," Sublette said. "Although she's handicapped on the outside, she's very intelligent and motivated for most situations life brings to her."

Griffith decided Hattiesburg was a better place to call home at that point. She also decided it was time to return to school. In 2006, she enrolled at William Carey University and two years later, transferred to USM because it was a bigger campus that could offer her more opportunity.

Judith Vestal is Griffith's occupational therapist as well as her friend. Vestal said Griffith's "indomitable spirit" stands out no matter what setbacks she faces.

"She's always positive; always ready for the next step," Vestal said.

Griffith acquired a nifty red scooter during the fall semester this year and is still getting used to scooting around campus.

"I run into things sometimes," Griffith admitted.

And she's still working on the best way to get to the goal she wants most: to be a writer … and a college graduate.

"I've always felt trapped by my speech impediment, and I feel that writing allows me to tell the stories my speech impediment holds me back from telling," Griffith said.

"A college degree – that's harder to define," she said. "It will open doors that, because of my disabilities might be closed. It shows employers and anyone else that I am capable. It shows I can finish what I started."

Those who know her best  have little doubt she'll be successful.

"She is going to be famous someday. Ann has always planned to write a book about her life. Someday the entire world will know who Ann Marie is and what she has overcome," said Sublette.
 

Ann Marie's Blog at The Student Printz Online