(upbeat music) - Hi, I am Jacqui Tricalcic, senior correspondent for One-on-One Joining us now is Trinity Jagdeo, who is the founder of a terrific organization called From We can't to We can.

Trinity, it's so great to have you with us.

- So nice to be here.

I'm super excited to be at this opportunity.

- Well, thank you, and I have to mention, you're a Russ Berrie Making a Difference winner.

Russell Berrie Foundation, a partner of ours, has been awarding unsung heroes throughout New Jersey for many, many years now.

And last year, you were an honoree, so congratulations on that.

- Thank you so much.

I really appreciate it.

- I wanna talk about all the incredible things that you are doing for children with disabilities through your organization, but first, I just think it's so important for us to talk about your best friend, Alexis.

Can you tell us a little bit about Alexis and how she was the person that really pushed you and helped you create this organization?

- Yeah, so Alexis was diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy at the age of two.

It's basically a degenerative disease that robs all muscle strength.

So I met her elementary school when we were five years old, and she was playing hopscotch just with the rest of the kids like it was nothing.

Even though she was in this big clunky wheelchair, she was weaving in and out of these hopscotch wears like it was nothing.

And it just really, I don't know what in that moment it did for me, but I just knew that I just really wanted to be her friend.

And so we've been best friends for the past 20 years and it's been just like any other friendship.

But I also got to experience a lot of the things that she went through, like the lack of resources, the lack of funding for some of the things that she needed, and of course, lack of accessibility and representation.

So I'm grateful that I am her friend because I'm able to figure out ways to empower her and be by her side.

- And I've seen that through your social media pages, just hanging out with Alexis and being there with her, especially during her stays in the hospital.

And you can just see from those videos how powerful your friendship is and your bond.

And like you mentioned, the lack of representation is something that really drove this for you.

And starting off by creating children's books, right?

There's five books so far that you've created using the organization to promote those.

Talk about some of those books.

One of them called "Savvy Sammi."

Tell us about that.

- I wrote "Savvy Sammi" a few short years ago, actually.

And I started creating these books because of the lack of representation in the entertainment industry.

So we have five books out to date, and one of them being "Savvy Sammi" who is based on Sammi Haney, and she is an Emmy nominated actress.

May have seen her in Netflix's "Raising Dion."

But the important part of the series is that they're based on real kids with disabilities.

And they're starred as superheroes because of how superheroes are so relatable to all of us.

It doesn't matter what their abilities are, anybody can look up to any sort of superhero.

So we started creating that representation through superheroes and through children's books.

And "Savvy Sammi" specifically, again, is about Sammi Haney, and her superpower is teleportation, which again drives the nail in about the importance of the accessibility.

Because she chose that superpower because of the fact that there is lack of accessibility and she wishes that she had access to everything.

And the teleportation superpower gives her that ability.

So just super cool things like that are in the book.

We get to personalize it.

So there are things that she loves, like her sidekick, Zeke, who's on a lizard that kind of stays on her shoulder, is an actual imitation of Sammi Haney's real pet lizard, Zeke.

So it's really cool that we're able to adapt these books.

- And so you're working with these people that you choose to be able to write the stories about these real people dealing with real situations.

How do you choose who you're gonna be working with and how do you work with them?

- It's definitely hard because we get a lot of people that wanna be nominated for our books and wanna be a part of this series.

I don't necessarily have a specific process.

I think I have more of a story in my head and those characters kind of align with those stories.

I've always been creative, I've always loved to draw and write.

And so those two worlds collided with the this book series.

So I come up with all of our stories and with the nonprofit, I'm always surrounded by kids within the disabled community.

So I've been inspired by quite a few of them.

So I think I have plenty of inspiration.

- Like you said, five books.

Another one called "Zappy Zane."

- Yeah.

- And several others.

I love the names.

You can find them on Amazon and through Trinity's website, which has been up throughout the interview as well, that you can check out.

So the organization started out with these books and these incredible children's books and the inspiration there, but it's evolved a little bit too.

Tell me what else you're doing.

- Yeah, we have done quite a lot.

When I think about it, my head spins a little, but we started out with the books and then we transitioned into creating accessible events.

I really just kind of wanted to solve all the issues that I saw Alexis is experiencing.

So we started hosting seasonal events.

So they are a range of different things.

We have accessible Christmas events, accessible Easter events, and then we might throw in a few other ones here and there.

But our biggest one that we have coming up is our fashion show fundraiser where we host at Rowan University.

And we have incredible people like Everett Jackson, which is the arena host for The Flyers.

We are inviting out some incredible leaders and local celebrities like Mara Justine from Maverick City Music.

So the opportunity of the fashion show gives us a time and a place to celebrate individuals that we support while inviting other people without disabilities on stage with them, because we imagine a world of unity.

And people with disabilities belong in the same spaces as people without disabilities.

So we make that happen on our runway in addition to raising funds for our non-profit.

And our overall goal is to eventually raise enough money and have enough funds to move into a building space to fully operate our resource recycler program, which is a program that gives new and used medical equipment to families who have been denied insurance coverage.

- That's incredible.

So much that you're doing so much on the horizon.

Last.

- Thank you.

- What does Alexis think about everything that you've accomplished so far?

What are those conversations with her like?

- I think it fuels her to keep going.

She's been in the hospital since December 13th, so it's been some time.

She's still in there.

And when she sees all the things that I'm doing, she knows I can't do it without her.

So she's my backbone.

So in turn, it's really just the work that she's doing and that's how I see it.

So she's thrilled.

She loves it.

(both chuckle) - Well, we can't wait to see what's next for the organization and for your journey.

Thank you so much for joining us today.

We really appreciate it.

- Thank you so much, Jacqui.

I really appreciate being here.

- We'll be right back after this.

- [Narrator] One-On-One with Steve Adubato is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Funding has been provided by The Russell Berrie Foundation.

Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.

RWJBarnabas Health.

Let’s be healthy together.

Eastern Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters.

The Turrell Fund, a foundation serving children.

New Jersey Sharing Network.

The North Ward Center.

Valley Bank.

And by EJI, Excellence in Medicine Awards.

A New Jersey health foundation program.

Promotional support provided by NJBIZ.

And by NJ.Com.

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