Inclusion Selkirk resident’s story explains why living in community is important
Terry Gunter’s family is continuing to share Terry’s story as a positive example of why people with intellectual disabilities need, not only strong family supports, but also strong community support. Last week they joined the Selkirk Catholic Women’s League Council at the Notre Dame Roman Catholic Church who hosted a showing of a video presentation called “Terry’ Story” about Terry’s life.
Terry Gunter was a Selkirk resident who passed away last year. Residents will likely remember his name as his family made a $10,000 donation to the new Inclusion multi-use building which will be located beside their current Wishme business on Eveline St. Terry was a client of Inclusion and his siblings Linda Paluck, Merv Gunter and Tricia Geurts continue to advocate for care for people with intellectual disabilities that respects their wishes, keeps them part of their communities, and helps them along the way.
“We talked and tried to share our little brother’s history. We had pages, and we did two and a half hours of videoing, and we have an 11-minute video for you. It’s not very long, but it does really show our brother,” said Geurts before the video was played.
The video told Terry’s story and began by sharing his love of music and how happy his siblings were when he came home from the hospital. It also shared about his birth which was double breach with the umbilical cord wrapped around his neck which caused stroke-like symptoms in Terry. He had difficulties communicating and with movement on one side of his body, and had intellectual disabilities.
Though doctors advised Terry’s mother to institutionalize him from birth, as they already had five other children at home, his parents decided against this and brought him home to the family.
“How we came to treat Terry became kind of the norm for how everybody treated Terry,” said Gunter in the video.
After Terry’s father passed away when Terry was five-years-old his mother realized that she couldn’t keep him at home anymore. He went to an institution and his family visited him every two weeks. In 1967 he was transferred to another institution, this time in Portage la Prairie. He didn’t enjoy living there but the family was in a bind because there was no one to care for him at home.
After some time, Terry’s mother teamed up with other parents in the same situation locally and they finally got Terry living, with care, in Selkirk. There were changes throughout his time in Selkirk but he lived his life in our community.
“Terry’s story is one of setbacks, challenges, hurdles and barriers that he faced, and he always overcame all of these obstacles with his good-natured optimism, determination, perseverance and his amazing sense of humour, these qualities and his quiet acceptance defined who he was as a person, that while he was different, intellectually and physically disabled, he was indeed a very special and unique person,” said Gunter in the video.
Terry’s journey also inspired his brother to work with others to create Continuity Care a not-for-profit organization which helps families plan for the future of their intellectually disabled family member.
Continuity Care and other organizations received a grant from the Manitoba Department of Families to create Terry’s and other video presentations to share as resources.
After the presentation, Suzanne Swanton, the Executive Director of Continuity Care and Maria Freeman the Executive Director of Inclusion Selkirk joined Terry’s siblings on stage.
Swanton started by explaining how this project came about.
“Continuity Care is part of a pilot project right now with four other organizations. We’re all out of 120 Maryland in Winnipeg. So, there’s us, there’s Inclusion Winnipeg, Community Living Manitoba, Innovative Life Options, and the Family Advocacy Network. We did receive some money from the Department of Families, and this pilot project came out of a report that was done on the Vulnerable Persons Act,” said Swanton.
The pilot project has a large scope that includes looking at developing support networks province-wide, looking at current legislation, and tying into this the idea of assisted decision-making which is somewhere in between independent decision making and substitute decision making which is where a substitute decision maker is legally recognized to make decisions on their behalf.
Through this project, they were able to make resources like Terry’s Story.
“We’ve created seven of these types of videos, each profiling different people’s stories and circumstances. They just have different flavours to them, and they are all impactful. I still watch this one, it brings tears to my eyes. So, we’re really proud of these,” said Swanton.
She also thanked Terry’s family for taking part in this project.
There was a brief question and answer session that ended the gathering.
The Selkirk Catholic Women’s League Council at the Notre Dame Roman Catholic Church also invites residents to check out their Winter/Christmas Craft and Vendor Sale from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the church on Nov. 23.
