2023.03 -- US Storybook 2022 updated 4.14 - Flipbook - Page 20
you think I wouldn’t do it?’ and so, I’m like ‘No, I’ll try. I’ll try to do it.”
Jada first started playing basketball when she was five years old, on an adaptive basketball team,
but it wasn’t the empowering experience she had hoped for. “I felt disabled. And I don’t [usually] feel
disabled. I’m not disabled. Also I was younger, and being in the chair kind of made me shorter, so I
can’t shoot even that far at all. Nobody was passing me the ball. They were all older.”
Jada emphasizes this a lot, the fact that she’s not disabled. “I always thought of disabled being more
able. Like, a lot of people can’t balance on one leg. But I have a short leg, so, when I’m standing up, I
always have to stand on one leg, so that improves my balance. So whenever I do a balance contest, I
always win.”
When Jada joined PeacePlayers last November, it was just what she had been looking for. “We
always work on teamwork and different core values every week or month. This month, it’s called
Culture of Collaboration. I like just the fact that it’s teamwork because I love that everybody has a
voice, because sometimes people get left out.”
Jada didn’t become the powerhouse that she is in a vacuum. Her mom has been an overwhelming
force in Jada’s growth into a self-assured and adventurous young person. “When I was younger, me
and my mom started to say affirmations, like “when I fall I get right back up.” We did it almost every
day. And I lived up to those affirmations, and so that just motivates me.”
As you can probably guess, Jada and her mom are tight. So tight that they started a business together:
the Love Juice Co., a natural juice and smoothie shop in Chicago’s South Side. “Well, actually, [it’s] my
mom’s business, but I’m going to have it when I’m older, like when I have more time to do stuff and
when I could drive.”
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PEACEPLAYERS UNITED STATES STORYBOOK