Monique “Dior” Jarrett has been living life to the fullest despite having a severe form of osteogenesis imperfecta type III.
It’s more commonly known as “brittle bone disease” and makes her more susceptible to fractures.
Monique has already broken her bones numerous times and needs to do a “bone-check” whenever she wakes up to make sure she didn’t inadvertently break any bones while sleeping.
Despite all that, she’s very active and is even a wheelchair dance champion with several medals to her name. She has also modeled for magazines such as Grazia.
Watch to find out more of her inspiring story.
[rumble video_id=v5xkc1 domain_id=u7nb2]
Video credit: Rumble
Monique, from Manchester, said: “My bones can break with the slightest touch, bump, cough or sneeze.
“I have to do a bit of a spot check every time I wake up, to make sure I’ve not broken a rib, or worse, a leg! It happens.
“I’ve got very lax limbs, so picking things up or holding things is sometimes difficult too. My organs are sort of squashed together, I’m quite a small package.
“It’s really important for me to stay active.
“Nobody else I know around me just sits about and does nothing. So whether I have a condition or not, I’ve always wanted to do what I want – even with the risk of breaking or dislocating something.”
While Monique thankfully didn’t suffer much bullying when she was in school, it still pained her to see her classmates play and move without any consequences.
“I wanted to ride a bike, I wanted to trampoline,” she said.
“I wanted to do all of those ‘normal’ things, but couldn’t without consequence.
“Everyone was so gentle with me in school. And my mom was my rock through it all, thankfully.”
But as she came to terms with her condition and became more experienced with it, she pushed her limits and became more active.
She started her wheelchair dance journey four years ago.
She said: “I always wanted to do some sort of exercise, but not the gym.
“It was about building my strength, mainly.
“I’ve felt so many benefits over the last couple of years since taking it [wheelchair dance] up.
“I’ve won a handful of trophies in competitions now, too. It shows that all my hard work has paid off.
“I’d say the most dangerous thing for me is crashing, but if you’ve got a good partner as I have, you should be fine.”
Every Saturday, she practices with her full-time partner Caitlyn McNiven and the pair compete two or three times in a year.
Caitlyn said: “I and Monique are much more than just dance partners now, we’re really close friends.
“I think Monique is really inspirational.
“Just the thought that doing any dance move could break one of her bones – it takes so much courage.
“I find it remarkable what she’s achieving.”
But that wasn’t enough for Monique, who also models in her spare time.
She said: “Modelling has definitely helped to improve my confidence.
“I do a lot of campaigns for body positivity.
“My biggest photoshoot was for the front cover of Grazia magazine – that was just amazing. I don’t know how that happened, I still don’t!
“It all makes me feel empowered.”
Monique is now focused on building her social presence as well as advocating body positivity. She’s also living proof that hard work and a good attitude can help you achieve anything in life.
She added: “My advice to others would be, if you really want to do something, work hard for it.
“I’m hoping that I can help more people by telling my story, that’s all I want to do.”
Replaced!