You've got to be able to adapt

If Tanis Jarbeau can have one thing back from her old life, it would be the ability to dance.

Sitting in a wheelchair, with-out her prosthetic leg, Jarbeau can only move from side to side, and has lost the balance needed to sway through the dance floor.

Jarbeau, a member of the Sudbury chapter of the Cana-dian Paraplegic Association Ontario, lost her leg in a snow blower accident around four years ago.

"You're in a chair now. You can't go where you wan to go.You've got to be able to adapt," she said.

"Everything I did before, I can do. Other than dance. When you go somewhere and there's people dancing, it's difficult."

Jarbeau was one of a dozen or so guests at the MS Centre of Hope on Wednesday. The centre held an open house for a new program, called Sudbury Peers Supporting Peers, a part-nership between support ser-vices in Sudbury dealing with physical disabilities. Sudbury's branch of the Multiple Sclerosis (MS) Society of Canada is hoping to share facilities, resources and information with groups like the Canadian Para-plegic Association Ontario, the Ontario March of Dimes, the Arthritis Society, the ParkSide Centre, the North Eastern Ontario Stroke Network, Polio Canada and the Independence Centre and Network (ICAN).

Jarbeau, who has been going to the Paraplegic Association for around a year now, is excited about the program.

"I think it's a good idea," she said, adding that she's looking forward to using the MS Soci-ety's computer lab.

Laurel Ireland, the chair of the Sudbury chapter of the MS Society and a spokesperson for Peers Supporting Peers, sees the program as an important step.

"If you're in a wheelchair or a walker, it doesn't matter how you got there. How you have to adapt is the same," she said. "All of the (organizations) are lim-ited financially as well as with people. We're burning the (vol-unteers) out."

Organizations involved in the open house will meet and review surveys given out at the event to decide where to go with the new program, which would allow different organiza-tions to share volunteers and combine self-help groups.

Sue Verrilli, of the North Eastern Ontario Stroke Net-work, thinks the program will help members find a larger support group.

"In the hospital, (members)are just so shocked, they're no ready to hear information.They have to go home and ren-ovate their houses. They don't know how to do it," she said.

"After six months to one year, it really sets in that your life has changed. Talking to others that have been through it already gives them hope."