At 8 a.m. on a recent Wednesday you might have spotted Rebeka Willett on the Modesto Junior College campus. She was the 18-year-old in a Raiders T-shirt and jeans, giggling along with her classmates as she practiced arabesques in a dance class. You would have seen a student like any other: sleepy, but learning and enjoying herself.
This isn't the way some people thought Rebeka Willett's life would turn out. She is the child of two disabled parents. Her mother has cerebral palsy. Tammy Willett is confined to a wheelchair. She needs help to eat and to use the bathroom. Rebeka's father, Clarence, 43, is developmentally disabled.
Some questioned whether the couple could raise a child. A public health nurse once told the Willetts to give Rebeka up for adoption. She said Rebeka would never learn to talk because Tammy can't talk.
This year Rebeka more than proved the critics wrong. She graduated -- on time -- from Davis High School. Now she's studying to be a preschool teacher. If Tammy could track down that public health nurse today, she would say, "You didn't think I could do it? Look at us now!"
Tammy, 48, developed cerebral palsy, a disorder of the central nervous system, at age 10. Doctors believe encephalitis -- inflammation of the brain -- brought on the condition. She fell into a six-week coma. When she woke up, her mind was intact, but her body was held hostage by muscles she no longer could control.
When she was 26, she met Clarence at Modesto's United Cerebral Palsy Association center. Clarence is mildly mentally retarded. His voice and demeanor sometimes seem like that of a little boy, with social skills to match. He's worked over the years at menial jobs, but doesn't work now.
The two married in 1989. Tammy's pregnancy a year later was a "surprise miracle," Tammy said in an e-mail interview. The first doctor they visited told them to leave -- he didn't want to treat Tammy. They found another physician. Rebeka was delivered by Caesarean section in May 1990, a healthy, normal baby.
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Not everyone saw the birth as a blessing. When Rebeka was about 2 months old, a woman on a dial-a-ride van saw the young family and said, "People like that shouldn't be allowed to have children." Clarence still smarts from that wound. He's hoping the woman who made that comment will read this story. "That way they can see that we did OK with her," he said.
Mom's not 'different' to Rebeka
When Rebeka was a baby, Tammy was stronger than she is today. She could get out of her wheelchair and wriggle alongside Rebeka as she crawled on the floor. She could cradle Rebeka in her arms and feed her.
By the time Rebeka was 4 or 5, she could drive her mom's wheelchair. By age 6, she could do it without running into anything.
Back then, a mom in a wheelchair was a fun novelty. In fourth grade, Rebeka took her mom to school for show and tell. She showed her classmates how the chair worked and told the story of her mom's disability.
"They thought it was really cool," remembered Rebeka. When she started having friends over after school, Rebeka would explain in advance what to expect so they wouldn't stare at Tammy.
For Rebeka, there was no "a-ha" moment when she suddenly realized Tammy wasn't like other mothers. She said she's never thought of her mom in those terms. She recently learned something in a child development class that she feels explains her bond with her mom: a newborn can identify their mother's face as soon as they come out of the womb, even if there are other people around. "I think since then I just never thought of her as different."
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