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Article
No need to Massage her ego
Individuality enables blind
orphan to persevere series of most unfavorable events, become successful
therapist
By
Phyllis Lader, The Smithtown News, September 7, 2006
Jessica
Thach lost her eyesight to measles at the age of two, but blindness was the
least of the obstacles she had to overcome en route to a successful career
as a massage therapist with Healing Hands Massage Therapy, PC., part of
Physical Therapy & Beyond in Smithtown and East Setauket. Abandoned by her
Vietnamese birth mother and the American soldier father she never knew, Ms.
Thach came to America in 1990 with no education, no skills and no knowledge
of English. She soon married and illegal immigrant from Mexico and bore him
three children, only to have him take up with another woman and return to
his homeland, leaving her alone to support the family.
Still
against all odds she used her pluck and determination to get an education,
learn a career skill, get off welfare and become happily self-sufficient in
a job she loves.
“I’m
really happy where I am now,” she said. “I wanted to work in a place with
more of a medical focus rather than a spa where people want to be pampered.”
Ms. Thach,
who isn’t even sure of her real age—“at least 35, but I could be 36 or 37,”
she said—was given up for adoption by her birth mother when she was six
months old. But her adoptive mother was then pressured by her own mother to
let her raise the little girl. Her adoptive grandmother, while very strict,
doted on her.
“She gave
me more attention than her real grandchildren,” she said, surmising that
part of the reason was due to her blindness and the other part was the
prejudice she faced from Vietnamese society because she was part American.
By 1983,
she said, there was a movement in the United States to get Amerasian
children out of Vietnam. But it wasn’t until six years later that she left
her homeland and came to the Philippines, where she spent six months in a
refugee camp. In January 1990, she left the Philippines and came to live in
Holbrook with the foster family that sponsored her.
“I
started school in 1990,” she said, “I had not education in Vietnam.”
Ms. Thach
was recommended for placement in the New York Institute for the Blind in the
Bronx, but she did not want to live in the dorms. So the agency that
brought her to America transferred her from her Holbrook foster family to a
family in College Point, Queens, so the bus could take her to and from
school.
“When I
was growing up, I was always on my own and had freedom,” she said. “But
when I came here the social workers would ask me questions, and I wasn’t
used to that.”
Ms.
Thach’s independent streak added to the tensions she felt in the Queens
household, and it wasn’t long before she sought—and found—a way out. At the
New Your Institute for the Blind, she met and befriended a fellow student
named George, and they ran away together. That didn’t last-long, however,
and she insisted that if she had to go back home it wouldn’t be to the
Queens family but to the Holbrook family.
“My
papers said I was still underage,” she explained.
Ms. Thach
returned to the Holbrook family and started Sachem High School in October
1990. Then, in May 1991—the year when,according to her papers, she turned
18—she decided to run away with George again and became pregnant. She and
George were married in August 1991 and their daughter Vanessa was born in
February 1992, followed by sons George in 1994 and Michael in 1995.
But in
1997, George had taken up with another woman. He ran off with his new
girlfriend to his native Mexico, taking the children with him.
“At the
time, I was living with his family in Brooklyn,” Ms. Thach said. “The plan
was that he’d take the kids until I landed on my feet.”
In
December 1997, Ms. Thach got her first guide dog, Taffy, from the Guide dog
Foundation for the Blind in Smithtown. She sent first for her daughter in
April 1998, but as it turned out, their paternal grandmother brought the
other two children back to the United States because their father decided he
didn’t want them.
“He does
not pay child support and he does not write to his kids,” Ms. Thach said of
her ex-husband. “He’s a jerk and he’s lazy.”
Ms. Thach
had moved to the Bay Shore after a Guide Dog Foundation classmate told her
of a friend there who needed a roommate. She and her children were on
public assistance, and she started studying for her General Equivalency
Diploma.
“When I
started, my teacher said my reading is like at a first grade level,” Ms.
Thach said. But she was determined to learn and through intensive study,
graduated with the diploma she coveted in 2000.
Now ready
to move on and learn a career skill, friends suggested massage therapy, and
she agreed. She was accepted into the Swedish Institute of Massage Therapy
in New
York City
and began classes in September 2001. But just when things started looking
up, there was another crimp in her plans—her landlord passed away, and his
sisters wanted to sell the house.
“I was
going to be homeless,” Ms. Thach recalled. But she called her foster mother
in Holbrook, who fortunately had a vacant basement apartment that she
invited her to use. Ms. Thach still lives there today.
School
was definitely a challenge. “There were some very tough courses on
neurology and endocrinology,” she said. But with the guidance of very
supportive teachers and classmates, plus her own determination to study and
succeed so she could get off welfare and get a job, Ms. Thach graduated from
the Swedish Institute in December 2002 and took her state board exam for her
massage license in January 2003.
“The six
weeks waiting for the result of the exam was torture,” she said, but when
the good news finally came, “I was jumping all around and hugging everyone.”
With her
license in hand, Ms. Thach began calling every sap she could think of, never
telling any of her prospective employers that she was blind. That March,
she began working at a Smithtown spa, first on a part-time basis and later
full-time. “By late 2003 I was off welfare and totally on my own. It felt
great. This is what I wanted,” she said. “I’m a very independent person.
My children don’t see me as a helpless blind person, and I know my kids are
proud of me. All the people that know me are proud of me.”
Last
December, a spa co-worker who had left to work for Cindi Prentiss Lattanzio,
the founder of Physical Therapy and Beyond, recommended Ms. Thach to Ms.
Lattanzio, who subsequently hired Ms. Thach when she opened a second office
in East Setauket in March.
Ms. Thach,
who gets county-provided door-to-door bus service to and from work for just
$3 a trip, works in Setauket on Mondays, Wednesday, and Fridays, and in
Smithtown on Thursdays and Saturdays. For more information about Healing
Hands Massage Therapy visit HealtingHandsMT.com or call 631-366-5111 or
631-841-3310.
Although
she had to start over again and gain now clients, “so far, so good,” she
said. While she tells some clients in advance that she is blind, others
don’t realize it until they spot her guide dog, Nimo, whom she received from
the Guide Dog Foundation after Taffy was retired. “My clients are great,”
she said.
In
addition to Swedish massage, which is “a big tension reliever that involves
using a lot of circular strokes.” Ms. Thach is an expert in sports massage
(which she said is particularly good for tennis elbow and golf elbow) as
well as trigger-point therapy, Shiatsu, deep-tissue massage, reflexology,
chair massage and pregnancy massage. She also uses a doll to help new moms
learn how to massage their babies. She has taken many continuing education
courses to expand and improve her skills.
“I love
what I do,” Ms. Thach exclaimed. “This is my way to help people with their
aches and pains. Even though I do it for pay, if I didn’t have to earn
money, I would do it for nothing. When my kids are older, I would love to
so some volunteer work at nursing homes or hospices because the people there
don’t get a lot of human touch.”
www.CindiPrentissPT.com
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