{"id":10466,"date":"2023-12-04T10:24:21","date_gmt":"2023-12-04T18:24:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hopeservices.org\/?p=10466"},"modified":"2023-12-04T10:54:58","modified_gmt":"2023-12-04T18:54:58","slug":"melisa-18-years-at-hope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hopeservices.org\/news\/melisa-18-years-at-hope\/","title":{"rendered":"A Conversation with Melisa: 18 Years of Empowerment at Hope Services"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t<div data-elementor-type=\"wp-post\" data-elementor-id=\"10466\" class=\"elementor elementor-10466\" data-elementor-post-type=\"post\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<section class=\"elementor-section elementor-top-section elementor-element elementor-element-0962148 elementor-section-boxed elementor-section-height-default elementor-section-height-default\" data-id=\"0962148\" data-element_type=\"section\" data-e-type=\"section\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-container elementor-column-gap-default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-column elementor-col-100 elementor-top-column elementor-element elementor-element-25fd350\" data-id=\"25fd350\" data-element_type=\"column\" data-e-type=\"column\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-wrap elementor-element-populated\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-53070d6 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"53070d6\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-e-type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<h2><em><strong>&#8220;What if one day, you wake up and find yourself in a wheelchair, how will you feel?\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/h2><p>Celebrating 18 years with Hope Services, Melisa shares her experiences and the profound impact of Hope&#8217;s programs, from finding support and friendship to landing a cherished job at the front desk. Her story is a powerful reminder of what we can achieve together.<\/p><h4><strong>When did you Join Hope Services?<\/strong><\/h4><p>I joined Hope&#8217;s family on June 21st, 2005. On June 21, 2023, I will have spent 18 years at Hope Services. Throughout, my time here at Hope, I have enjoyed all the support, gained friends, and most importantly got a job at the front desk which, I do Fridays once a month. I am so grateful for my job.<\/p><h4><strong>What has been your most memorable experience here at Hope Services?<\/strong><\/h4><p>Knowing that I can get a job and get support without any judgment itself is enough for me. I love to come to Hope every day, and in the last 18 years, I have been coming here five days a week. Because Hope Services is like a family to me, I have even encouraged my cousin to enroll her child in EMCC program because I think Hope is the right place to help realize your dreams as an individual with a disability.<\/p><h4><strong>If you could share three things you like about EMCC what would it be?<\/strong><\/h4><p>There are so many things I love about Hope and EMCC in particular.<\/p><ol><li>I love coming to this program every day, I enjoy waking up to come to this program. The feeling is so special when I know that I am coming to Hope.<\/li><li>I love going to the community with my friends. I am not going out as much as I want, but when I do, it means a lot to me.<\/li><li>I love my job, and I enjoy training new clients on the job. I feel valued and respected when Stacy, Julie, or Melisa R asks me to train new front desk clients. I have been on this job for seven years, and I am so proud of my job.<\/li><\/ol><h4><strong>What else do you want people to know about you?<\/strong><\/h4><p>I want people to know that at the age of 11 years, I was put in a wheelchair, but before that, I was using a cane or a walker to move. My life hasn\u2019t been easy. I want people to understand that being in a wheelchair is very difficult experience, there are so many things I would want to do, but I can\u2019t.\u00a0<em><strong>I will leave you with this question. What if one day, you wake up and find yourself in a wheelchair, how will you feel?<\/strong><\/em><\/p><p><!-- notionvc: 4f73b56e-7e10-4380-8f56-dfe5d4f41f6a --><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;What if one day, you wake up and find yourself in a wheelchair, how will you feel?\u201d Celebrating 18 years with Hope Services, Melisa shares her experiences and the profound impact of Hope&#8217;s programs, from finding support and friendship to landing a cherished job at the front desk. Her story is a powerful reminder of&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":10467,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[206],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[470,787,99,117,190,1287,1429,101,205,98,450],"class_list":["post-10466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","wpautop"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v14.4.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>A Conversation with Melisa: 18 Years of Empowerment at Hope Services | Hope Services<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow\" \/>\n<meta name=\"googlebot\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta name=\"bingbot\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hopeservices.org\/news\/melisa-18-years-at-hope\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Conversation with Melisa: 18 Years of Empowerment at Hope Services | Hope Services\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&#8220;What if one day, you wake up and find yourself in a wheelchair, how will you feel?\u201d Celebrating 18 years with Hope Services, Melisa shares her experiences and the profound impact of Hope&#8217;s programs, from finding support and friendship to landing a cherished job at the front desk. 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