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What constitutes a "Grand Slam"?

By definition, it represents the "best of" or achieving all of the most significant accomplishments.

That's how we feel about Giselle's story. In many ways, she epitomizes the spirit, mission and impact of Triumph Foundation.

We hope you enjoy learning how your gifts transformed her life.

This is our way of giving thanks to you this Thanksgiving.

You've gotta watch her video.

Grand Slam

Exactly three years from today, on November 20, 2015, Giselle was on top of her game, working as a social worker and living a happy healthy life enjoying hiking, dancing and friends. She had no idea how much her life would change before the next morning.

That night, she fell out of bed - something so simple that has happened to all of us - but she tragically broke her C4 & C5 vertebrae in her neck, damaging her spinal cord becoming a quadriplegic. Her life traumatically changed in an instant.

Not long after, we met her at our annual Christmas Outreach party at Northridge Hospital. We gave her a Care Basket full of resources and goodies- but it was more than that - it was her first hope for a life beyond injury. She became a regular attendee at the weekly support group, learning to cope with her injury by our Ambassadors, and inspiring others to do the same.

Giselle made great strides in her recovery. Through grit, determination and hard work in physical therapy, she regained the ability to walk!

However, she still faced significant limits to her activities of daily living and faced a crisis of employment as well.

During her rehabilitation, she was unable to work and struggled to make ends meet. When she was ready to return to her job, Giselle required accommodations that her employer, the Los Angeles Unified School District, was unable to provide.

Recognizing her needs and great potential, Triumph gave her our Bill Hollman Employment Achievement Award to help Giselle launch a private family counseling practice to continue the work that she loves.

Her story of injury, recovery, and returning to contribute her talents to the community - Giselle represents a “grand slam” in terms of outcomes.

We are proud to have played a role in her journey and triumph.

OTL

Another Grand Slam was our recent Over-the-Line Wheelchair Baseball Tournament.

We had over 100 people join us at the ballpark to compete in OTL. Every year this event gets more popular and more competitive.

Thank you to all of our volunteers and sponsors who helped us hit this event out of the park.

See more pictures

Giving Thanks

We hope this Thanksgiving you know how grateful we are for your support – and you see how your gifts are fruitful, making a world of difference for those we serve.

#GivingTuesday is coming up fast, we hope you'll consider making a gift to Triumph to help make more "Grand Slams" possible.

With love & gratitude,

Andrew Skinner

If you or someone you know needs help, please contact us.