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Wauwatosa, Wisconsin — Gianni Quintero, 14, spent a recent Friday night at The Ability Center’s Open Gym night playing wheelchair basketball with some friends.
What you need to know
- The Competence Center was established in Wauwatosa in 2008.
- Founder Damian Bachmann wanted a place where people of all abilities could be “healthy, active and playful”.
- Partnerships with PNC Bank and Dick’s Sporting Goods offer even more opportunities for ‘Open Gym’ and other programs held throughout the region.
At an event at Whitman Middle School, Quintero said, “I’m already a player, so I’m here to help teach myself and play.
He began participating in adaptation programs at The Ability Center about seven years ago. At that time he lost the mobility of his left leg.
“All I know is that I had a cold-like illness and it just sat there killing the stuff on my left leg.
From an early age he was always into sports, so even after being paralyzed he still wanted to play. He said it was difficult at first.
“For the most part, it was like getting used to life again,” Quintero said. “You have to understand all the maneuvers, the pushes, you have to understand your daily life because you have to understand how to open doors for yourself, how to sit on a chair and be independent. because you have to.”
That’s why Damien Bachman founded Ability Center. He wanted to give people of all abilities the opportunity to be healthy, active and playful.
“When we say play, our ultimate goal is for everyone, with or without a disability, to have the opportunity to play together,” Bachman said. “Disabled, intellectually disabled, undisabled — we don’t really care. We just want to provide opportunities for the community to play.”
Starting this organization hit close to home for Buckman. When he was in middle school, he was diagnosed with osteosarcoma in his right leg.
He had been in remission for seven months, but just one month into his freshman year, the cancer had spread and he was diagnosed with cancer in his left leg.
“So my legs are essentially extremity salvage, essentially metal from the hips to the ankles on both legs,” Backman said.
He can stand and walk, but cannot run or jump as normal basketball requires. Adaptive gyms and programs existed when he was growing up, but he didn’t know about it.
He said he wants to be the reason why children in similar situations find out about these programs today.
“Doctors were literally telling my mom to take me home so I could rest easy when I was diagnosed a second time,” Buchman said. So for me, it’s all about honoring my survivorship and what I call the new normal.”
The Competence Center hosts an Open Gym in Wauwatosa once a month. Other locations around Milwaukee hold more merchandise, thanks in part to partnerships with PNC Bank and Dick’s Sporting Goods.
It also recently launched a 3-on-3 wheelchair basketball league, with a new season beginning in April.
Buchman and Quintero said allowing everyone to participate, regardless of whether they need a wheelchair, opens the door to more inclusiveness.
“The chair is our shoe and our basketball shoe,” says Quintero. “You can see another sport, another way people play another sport, how they adapted it.”
Quintero, a freshman in high school, hasn’t given up on his disability. He aspires to become a Paralympic athlete, and Bachman believes he will definitely make it happen.
“I don’t feel like my goal has been achieved because there is still more to do and more to try after that,” Quintero said.
That’s the message Buckman wants to convey, opening the door to endless possibilities through a level playing field in an open gym.
Click here to find out where the next Open Gym will be held, or learn more about the Ability Center.
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