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“I really don't think there's an area of my life that the pandemic hasn't touched, whether it's through my home healthcare or my ability to go out and do things socially.” Teri Whitaker has muscular dystrophy, which impacts her lung function. She…

"Distressed" and "oppressed," is how Tony and Connie Blair describe the city of Gary and the Northwest Indiana region where the Blind Social Center is located. They founded the center in 2014 after Mr. Blair, a general contractor, lost his eyesight…

"Both me and my husband have high risk conditions and my son does too. We stayed home most of last year and it's been rough." Marty Stone lives in Noblesville, Indiana and is the mother of an 11-year-old daughter and a 16-year-old son with multiple…

The school principal was shaking her head. "She said that I wasn't wanted." At first, Zully Alvarado thought the American grammar school she was so excited about attending was rejecting her because, as an emigrant to the U.S. from Ecuador, her…

Kylee Hope was Director of Indiana's Division of Disability and Rehabilitative Services during the first 18 months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Interviewed shortly after that period, when she had recently retired from her position, she provides an…

"You cannot walk onto a unit and see visible injuries on 12 of 14 people that weren't there the week before and not suspect something is terribly wrong there." Two officials share observations about the treatment of residents at Muscatatuck State…

"Our society told parents at that time, they’re retarded, you don’t want them at home, stick them in an institution, forget that they were born." Three interviewees who worked as staff at Muscatatuck and New Castle State Hospitals in the 1960s and…

“That was a huge experience for me,” Ronelle Johnson recalls of her term as President of Indiana Chapter of Black Deaf Advocates (ICBDA). “I decided to be involved in the Deaf community because their needs for advocacy was great.” Having lost her…

"They was mean to me. And I'm glad I'm not in an institution no more.” Beth was sent to an Indiana institution when she was young. She didn’t have the opportunity to go to school but states she learned to write and do math. After leaving Muscatatuck…

"I train psychiatrists, psychologists, police officers, and correctional officers." Ray Lay is an Indiana Certified Recovery Specialist and Veterans Administration Peer Support Specialist. He describes how his life evolved from being homeless to…