Beating the odds: Turner woman performs in her 22nd dance recital

AUBURN — Kimberly MacDonald and Linda Eberhardt-MacDonald pulled up to the Group Minimal Theater on Sunday for Kimberly’s 22nd dance recital with Mary Jane’s College of Dance.

The mother and daughter of Turner are conveniently half an hour late, but quiet and collected.“God doesn’t give extra time to people today with exclusive wants,” Eberhardt-MacDonald said.

Kimberly has MSP1, a uncommon metabolic condition that restrictions her mobility, stunts her development and benefits in a degenerative eye issue. In several conditions, it will come with a shortened lifestyle expectancy.

Eberhardt-MacDonald believes her daughter, who is 28, is the oldest man or woman in the point out with the ailment.

4 toes tall and complete of frame of mind, Kimberly is not sitting on the sidelines. She’s dancing like the whole globe is seeing.

Acknowledged to several as “Kimmy,” she rolls into the area backstage the place dancers of all ages greet her warmly.

The dancers are psyching by themselves up for their routines. Tap dancers nervously tap. Costumes are tweaked. Dancers crisscross the room carrying out backbends and flips.

Kimberly explained she has not a shred of nervousness. She chats with her previous buddy Deanna Morency, a Mary Jane University of Dance alumni who has prolonged since relocated to Boston but arrives back each calendar year to help out with the recital.

Amber LaFrance, 18, and Mallory Langlois, 15, are in Kimberly’s dance regimen.

“Kimmy knows what she’s executing,” Lafrance explained. “Sometimes Mallory and I struggle, but Kimmy’s received it.”

Dance studio owner Mary Jane Leonard choreographed their dance to a song Kimberly selected from the Broadway demonstrate “Aladin.” Kimberly stars as Jasmine.

“She loves her Disney princesses,” Langlois reported.

Kimberly’s mother has a idea about why dance is such a terrific match for Kimberly.

“A good deal of the persons in theater are extremely talented and super good,” she said. “They have to be self-confident and a minimal eccentric. They acknowledge Kimberly with her disabilities, her uniqueness.”

Leonard has been observing Kimberly dance because she was 4 years previous.

“I’ve viewed Kimmy improve,” she claimed. “It’s pleasant to observe any one progress.”

About the a long time, as Kimberly’s physical situation deteriorated, her dance apply was adjusted to accommodate her.

“Mary Jane started to individualize Kimmy’s instruction, as properly as her performances on phase,” her mom stated. “In 2005, when Kimmy was recovering from spinal surgical treatment, they did the dance with Kimmy in a wheelchair.”

This year, right after the latest surgical treatment, Kimberly is working with her wheelchair yet again but is in a position to stands in the course of the program with the aid of Mallory and Amber.

Ten minutes ahead of their regime, Kimberly’s mom wrangles her daughter and wheelchair up a narrow staircase that sales opportunities to the stage. It is a tight in good shape and chaotic.

Times prior to Kimberly goes on phase, her mom thrusts a personal computer tablet into her palms for her daughter to unlock and established to report. She whirls all around and recruits an additional dancer waiting in the wings to help her tape her daughter’s functionality.

“You study to check with for assist,” Eberhardt-MacDonald explained.

“We normally purchase the DVD” from the faculty, she said. “It retains her going all calendar year lengthy. She watches the prior recitals. She will get up and dance. It presents her a rationale to maintain likely.”

Kimberly, Amber and Mallory’s dance went off devoid of a hitch and the group applauded uproariously.

“I simply cannot feel it, we did it,” Kimberly’s mother reported as Kimberly exited the stage for the past time. “Another 12 months done!”