“Lhe most beautiful victory is being able, through my testimony, to help people who find themselves experiencing diversity» he affirms Veronica Yoko Plebani, paralympic athlete which, in 2011, just 15 years old, due to a fulminant bacterial meningitis, she found herself without some phalanges of hands and feet, with her body covered with indelible marks. But the inner strength has never left her: today 27 years old, she took her revenge thanks to sport.
His palmarès is full of medals – including the bronze won at Tokyo Paralympics in 2021 – but the most important one is represented by his social commitment, thanks to which he manages to be a example of courage and redemption especially for people who do not feel represented.
Protagonist of the docuseries “Unbelievable Me”
Protagonist of awareness campaigns on social networks, with a book to his credit “Flowers Hungry for Life” published for Mondadori and a docufilm “body to body” screened at the cinema last year, now, the Paralympic triathlon champion also arrives on TV.
He is, in fact, among the protagonists of the docuseries “Unbelievable Me: Extraordinary Stories” which, broadcast from Friday 3 March, in the late evening at 10.40pm on real-time and later available on Discovery+, it tells true stories of ordinary people struggling to overcome serious illnesses, preventing their disabilities from dominating their lives.
Independence found thanks to sport
“Before the illness, I enjoyed snowboarding, but it was just a hobby. Only during my rehabilitation I discovered that sport could help me regain my independence. Alone, in a canoe in the middle of the river, I felt the sensation of freedom again » she says.
Through the competitive sporting activity which, at the age of 18, allowed her to reach the Sochi Winter Paralympics on her snowboard and then arrive in Rio, in 2016, by canoe, and in 2021 on the podium in Tokyo in the triathlon discipline, she has established a special relationship with her body.
Inclusive beauty, beyond all limits
«This splendor of scars – he explains – from a problem has become a solution. All that I am able to do now is thanks to my complex body that I have decided to show to contribute to a more inclusive representation of beauty, beyond all limits and conventions”.
Mission that he also shares with the other protagonists of the docuseries, such as Tilly Lockeya British teenager who was diagnosed with meningococcal septicemia and uses bionic arms, Nick Smith, one of the smallest men in the worldsuffering from microcephalic osteodysplastic primordial dwarfism, and the Indian student Lalit Patidar affection from hypertrichosisknown as Werewolf Syndrome.
The importance of storytelling to raise awareness
«Telling my story in this TV program is a new adventure that allows me to reach an audience that may not yet know me. Among other things, it was also broadcast on Discovery in other countries, such as Brazil and Costa Rica, from where I received several messages of support and appreciation »he says.
It is precisely thanks to the strength of these stories that disability can be perceived as an opportunity to talk about accessibility and inclusion.
Normalize is one of Veronica’s favorite verbs who, through this incessant awareness-raising activity, hopes to be able to contribute to transform the narrative of his extraordinary life – like that of many other people with disabilities or any kind of diversity – in a common story.
Veronica Yoko, champion of body positivity
It is a continuously erupting volcano champion of body positivity which has also brought its diversity to the catwalk with important brands that are investing in inclusiveness.
«Each of us should be able to accept our own body and freely express our uniqueness» he affirms, while he doesn’t contain the emotion for the master’s degree in political communication which he will achieve in days, after the three-year degree in political science.
In the meantime he continues his sports training and is already thinking about the project of one digital platform on which to consolidate a community to offer opportunities for comparison and exchange of information on the world of disability.
The essence of the young protagonist of “Unbelievable Me” is also contained in hers name Veronica Yokochosen by the mother, which in Buddhist culture means solar child and has the sound of a prediction: “perhaps, having to explain the meaning of my name from an early age, I gradually recognized myself and convinced myself that I am like this, despite the adversities”.
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