Tag: Down Syndrome
A Model With Down Syndrome Fulfills Her New York Fashion Week Dream
Marian Avila, a 21-year-old Spanish model with Down syndrome, fulfilled her dream to walk at New York Fashion Week thanks to an Atlanta designer she met through the magic of social media.
And she did it with flair Saturday in the ballroom of a Midtown hotel in evening looks of red and gold, her parents and siblings in the audience and other models who have challenges by her side.
“I felt really happy and I really loved the runway,” Avila said through a translator after the Saturday show. “I wanted to show the world that there are no barriers.”
No barriers for women of all kinds is Talisha White’s mission, as a designer focused on prom, pageant and special occasion outfits and as an active pageant contestant as well.
A model White knew had stumbled on a story about Avila’s fashion week dream online. She told White of Avila’s quest and they reached out to Avila on Facebook.
“She’s been a busy supermodel, meeting with all types of people,” White said of the attention Avila and her dream have received in the United States, her home country and across Europe. “I’m very glad for her. She’s been meeting with Vogue. She’s been meeting with Harper’s Bazaar. She’s been meeting in different showrooms, different modeling agencies.”
Avila is from the Benidorm area, in the province of Alicante in eastern Spain on the Mediterranean coast. She was accompanied by her parents and siblings. At home, she said, “I practice every day,” referring to her love of modeling.
“I’m studying modeling and to become an actress,” Avila said.
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Mother tried to poison daughter who has Down syndrome
An Upstate mother is accused of trying to murder her daughter who has Down syndrome by poisoning her with medication.
Pamela Ann Contreras, 68, of Spartanburg, has been charged with attempted murder and abuse of a vulnerable adult. Contreras put prescription drugs in her daughter’s drink in an attempt to kill her, according to arrest warrants.
A police officer responded to an attempted suicide on Dec. 7.
The officer arrived to Contreras’ apartment and found her daughter in the kitchen holding a glass of orange liquid with a powdery substance along the edge, according to an incident report.
The officer took the drink from the victim, who would not speak. Contreras later told the officer that her daughter does not talk.
Contreras said she used a pill grinder to grind up medication that she placed in her daughter’s drink. She then planned to stab her to death when she passed out, the report states.
Contreras told the officer that she feared no one would care for her daughter after she died. She claimed she also drank a similar mixture, but an officer noted in the report that Contreras’ glass was mostly full, while her daughter’s large glass only had around two inches of liquid left in the bottom.
Both women were taken to the hospital for treatment.
Contreras was booked into the Spartanburg County Detention Center on Tuesday.