Today marks the beginning of FASD Month 2025 – a time to increase awareness, share knowledge, and most importantly, celebrate the voices of those with lived and living experience.
Today, we want to take a moment to reflect on the core message of FASD Month: inclusion.
We are honoured to share a powerful and deeply personal poem written by Dorothy Fenwick, a passionate advocate, research team member, and individual with living experience of FASD.
Invited to the Table
by Dorothy Fenwick
There is a table, and it is a rather large one. With chairs neatly arranged about it. With name cards properly placed, and pads of paper and pens at the ready. White walls with charts. Computers with data. People with learning.
The people who will sit there are from all walks of life with various ages and experience. Really great people. Important people. Educated people.
These people have degrees, and use fancy words, peppered with statistics and backed with scientific research.
People with knowledge. People with expertise. People with a voice.
I have seen many of these tables from afar, shrouded in mystery and importance. With people standing at podiums and other people having whispered conversations, coupled with wise looks and knowing head nods.
As I have passed by them, I have always wondered, and even hoped, that they will be the magic group that unravels the mystery, and ushers in the utopia of understanding and inclusion.
You see, I have FASD. A whole body syndrome that has and will, affect me for my whole life. For better or for worse, I can never be divorced from it. I know what I know. I have experience. I have insight. I have wisdom.
But I was never invited to the table, UNTIL TODAY.
At last, there was a seat for me, a place to share my thoughts and struggles. My hopes and frustrations. A place where I have a voice and can use my voice to affect change. I have waited long for this. Even prayed for it. But it never came… UNTIL TODAY.
Thank you for the journey that begins today towards greater understanding, united effort and a compassionate foray into the world of FASD. Thank you for letting me have a seat.
This fall, Dorothy will attend the Canada FASD Conference as a supported participant through the Lived Experience Leadership Fund. As we enter FASD Month, we invite you to help ensure that more voices like Dorothy’s can be heard. Please make a donation today to make this happen.
Your contribution helps cover travel, accommodation, registration, and other associated costs – allowing individuals with FASD and their caregivers to fully participate in critical conversations and national initiatives.
From all of us at the Canada FASD Research Network, we wish you a meaningful and impactful FASD Month, however you choose to engage.