Carla Moultrie is Author, and Autism Advocate. She is a parent advocate for children with Autism and connects other parents to resources, education, and support. Ausome Girl shares the amazing world of a little girl named Camille who has Autism Spectrum Disorder and Sensory Processing Disorder.
This children’s story illustrates how Autism affects her and how her family, teachers, and friends support her. Ausome Girl shines a light on the characteristics of Autism while bringing awareness to the strengths that children with Autism have.
Carla’s hope is that the Ausome Girl series will aid children and adults with becoming more empathetic and understanding to their peers that may be different from them.
Carla is a proud alumnus of Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University, the University of Phoenix and is pursuing her Master of Business Administration degree at the prestigious Terry School of Business at the University of Georgia
This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix
TRANSCRIPT
Intro: [00:00:02] Welcome to Spark Stories, where entrepreneurs and experts share their brand story and how they found their spark, the spark that started it all.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:00:13] Welcome to Spark Stories Live Business Radio brought to you by the Atlanta Business Radio Network. Every week, entrepreneurs and experts share the stories behind the brand who they are, what they do, and why their brands matter. I’m your host, Clarissa Jae Sparks. In our own series, we dove into the everyday operations of inspiring small business owners in our community. You can listen live on Saturdays or the rebroadcast at WW dot Business RadioX dot com. Today we’re going to talk about building a brand around causes you’re passionate about and why it’s important to build community that fosters a safe environment. Please allow me to introduce one of our amazing community leaders who owns it, Carla a Moultrie. She is a sister, wife, mother, professional encourager, author and autism advocate. She is a proud alumnus of Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University, the University of Phenix, and is pursuing her master of business administration at the prestigious Teri School of Business at the University of Georgia. She is a parent advocate for children with autism and connects other parents to resources, education and support. Through the many experiences she and her husband they thank, you have compiled navigating as parents with a special needs child. Her hope is that the Awesome Girl series will aid children and adults with becoming more empathetic and understanding their peers that may be different from them and how they can support them. Additionally, her hope is that those that live with autism and other differences will be embraced and will have more spaces created that would include them. Let’s welcome Carla Moultrie. Welcome, Carla.
Carla Moultrie: [00:01:59] Thank you. Thank you so much.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:02:02] You know, I’m so excited to have you here today to talk about your experience as an entrepreneur, as an author, as we read in your bio. You wear a lot of hats and the hat that you’re wearing today is this author. Yes. And we’re here to talk about autism and raise awareness around your awesome girl. So just tell our listeners who you are.
Carla Moultrie: [00:02:26] Okay. Well, I am Carla Moultrie. I am a native Floridian. I’m an alumnus of Florida A&M University, the University of Phenix. As I mentioned, I am pursuing an MBA at the University of Georgia. But mostly importantly, I am a wife and a mother to an amazing, awesome little girl, Camille.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:02:46] Oh, Camille, tell us a little bit about your journey with starting to author the book about Camille.
Carla Moultrie: [00:02:54] Camille now is eight years old. When Camille was two years old, she started displaying symptoms of autism. My husband and I had literally just moved here from New Jersey here to the metro Atlanta area from New Jersey. And we thought, you know, her her behaviors were just behaviors with being in a new environment. She was having some withdrawal symptoms, just pulling away, not really wanting to be around other kids. So we just we really initially thought it was about just the new environment. And shortly, maybe two or three weeks after being here, my husband started noticing that she wasn’t using her words as before. And he just mentioned she’s not using her words as much. And we found a pediatrician. We spoke to the pediatrician, and the pediatrician just said, oh, this is typical. She’s a little girl. She’ll probably just speak later. Don’t worry. Don’t worry. Waited another month or so. We just kept seeing, you know, very little communication, the no eye contact, just the withdrawal from people in general. And I started doing my own research, start Googling, and I kept seeing autism. Autism. And we got we got her into a developmental pediatrician. And they told us initially that she didn’t have enough symptoms to be diagnosed as autistic. And one thing that we found out in this process is that autism typically manifests differently in girls than it does little boys. One thing that we noticed is that we have found out is that girls typically are like shyer and quiet, where boys typically have a lot of the behavioral issues.
Carla Moultrie: [00:04:37] So girls get misdiagnosed or diagnosed a lot later than boys. So after about a year of constantly trying to, you know, getting first and second and third opinions, we finally got an autism diagnosis right before she turned three. We got the diagnosis. You know, they told us all these things that she would probably never do. We would they told us to prepare to. Ever hear her say mom or dad to prepare to potentially institutionalize her one day? Just prepare to just have a different life. Because children a lot of children with autism have challenges. And, you know, they don’t know. They don’t live typical lives. So obviously, I was devastated. I remember just just breaking down and crying in the doctor’s office. And my husband, being a minister, just said she’ll be okay. He just patted me on my shoulder. He’s like, she’ll be okay. He was extremely confident. He’s been confident since day one that she would be okay. And after about a month, I was really just devastated. I swung into action and started looking for different types of therapies. And for about the first year, we were just doing therapies. And she wasn’t really responding. She just was you know, we were just going through the motions. So when she turned about four, it just it was like a light just flipped.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:05:56] And she became her own timing.
Carla Moultrie: [00:05:58] And her own timing, she became this ball of energy. And just she’s she began to just really thrive. Her words begin to come back and just her attention, her eye contact, just the a lot of the things that we were told she wouldn’t do. She started doing wow. And it’s just been amazing to watch the last four, four and a half years of her just just thrive and just really, really go on. So that inspired me just to do a children’s book or a book that teach children and adults about autism. Because as I said earlier, a lot of times we’re told most times we’re told when we get the autism diagnosis is that our children will not be able to do a lot of the typical things. And I am here to say that she is defying the odds. She’s doing everything that she was said.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:06:53] That’s awesome.
Carla Moultrie: [00:06:54] That’s awesome. You know.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:06:55] Exactly. That is awesome. And, you know, it’s very interesting, like you said, to hear the diagnosis in the in the doctor’s office. And then you have to spring into action and you have to take first. You have to process. Yes. And then you have to come up with an action plan. And that’s part of the entrepreneurial journey as well, is knowing that even when you have a thought in mind, it’s something is, you know, raising a child. You have to learn how to pivot. Exactly. You have to learn to make adjustments. You have to learn to adapt. And as a woman of many hats, you are able to do that and you are able to find the resources and the education that you needed to help. Guide you and your husband through the process of raising an awesome girl.
Carla Moultrie: [00:07:43] Exactly.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:07:44] And what advice or words of encouragement would you give to someone who’s starting a business or they receive a bad diagnosis from their physician?
Carla Moultrie: [00:07:56] One one piece of advice I would give a person who has received a diagnosis, a bad diagnosis. Is that ta to to to look, to see, look, to see how that diagnosis can help others. Because that’s the one thing that I’ve learned in my life, is that everything that happens to us is not necessarily a bad thing. It’s really to help other people. And I thought about a way that I could help other people. And that’s why I said, you know, in particular the African American community. I found out that a lot of times we don’t talk about autism a lot and we are afraid to talk about it or we’re made to feel bad about it. And I wanted to show a little black girl who is brave, who is smart, who is intelligent, how she can be awesome, and how she can do just what anybody else can do. So I would encourage other persons who are who receive a bad diagnosis to think about the diagnosis is how they can help other people. I don’t think things happen to us just to happen to us. I believe things happen that maybe that may look like it’s a negative to always help somebody else. And that’s what this this book has done. I mean, literally all across the world, people have reached out to me wanting to share Awesome Girl this book. And it’s been, you know, a motivation to little girls. I mean, parents have emailed me saying, my little girl wants to be awesome girl. They want beads in their hair. So I’m looking at it from that vantage point and I’m seeing that it’s doing just exactly what I what I had purposed in my heart to do, and it’s to help other people.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:09:40] And that’s really good, too. So from that moment at two years old to around four, after you found she started becoming into her own and being even more awesome, you decided, I want to be able to impact others by sharing Camille’s story. Mm hmm. What was that process like? How did you say, you know what? Because there are a lot of ways that you can share your story. But what made you want to actually put pen to paper or come up with the book when you could have chose maybe something else?
Carla Moultrie: [00:10:13] You know, initially I had to get past the grieving process. I had to get past the process of potentially not doing typical things with my daughter. Like I remember I wanted we saw we noticed that she could tumble really well and do do tricks that look like gymnastics really well. So I wanted to get her in an adaptive gymnastic class. Well, we took her to the first class and she couldn’t follow directions. And I was just I had a meltdown, and my husband was like, she’s going to be okay. That’s that’s what he always says. And what what what what encouraged me was when I saw another friend of mine who who has a daughter with special needs, she has hearing loss. And we were talking about just, you know, how to journal our, you know, just journal to start writing. So I started journaling, you know, in my own private time, you know, about my experience with autism. And then I started looking, you know, just started wanting. My mother in law is a retired educator. She would always send me little books for little girls, you know, about the hair or any different little things. So I’m starting to look through all these little books that I’m receiving from my daughter, and I didn’t see anything that really looked like her or told her story. So I said, Well, let’s do a children’s book about a little girl who has autism. And my inspiration really was Superman. You know, Clark Kent is Superman. He turns into Superman. What kamille Moultrie turns into Awesome Girl. And and that’s that was my inspiration. And that’s what caused me to turn the table from being a little disappointed from grief to just joy.
Carla Moultrie: [00:11:53] You know, I know that my daughter is intelligent. She’s really smart. I remember the first time we had our IQ test that I was very shocked that on certain levels of the test, she was the first time she was five years old. We saw that she was always test. She tested three years ahead of herself. At five she was testing with eight year olds. We just had her tested about a month ago. She’s eight now. She’s testing on certain areas with an 11 year old. So that’s that’s so comforting to know that she’s still well able to do a lot of things just may look a little different for her in some cases. But she’s able and I would just encourage any other parent who is or a caregiver who is caring for a child with autism or any differences just to not lose hope. Expose, expose, expose, expose. Expose your child to different things. Like this morning my daughter started swim lessons. Oh, that’s great. And my husband was sending me pictures and just really excited. Just he’s like. She’s like a natural already out there in the pool, just just doing it. So I think that’s key to parents, you know, and caregivers of children with differences and autism just to expose, you know, find time for yourself, you know, reflect on how and be honest about how you feel. And from then on, just just expose your child, you know, find out what’s the what are their strengths and and help to strengthen those different things. And that’s what we’re doing with Camille.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:13:21] That’s good. One of the things that you mentioned, too, is that you start journaling, but that was a record through a recommendation from someone else who has a child with special needs. And I think what resonates with me is that that’s all about building community and having a support system so that when you’re starting something new or you are experiencing a new life circumstance, that you have community. So what is how important is community to you with this phase in your life?
Carla Moultrie: [00:13:53] Oh, community is absolutely essential. One of my friends who is also a Florida A&M alum, she she also has a daughter who’s autistic. And we’ve shared different different conversations about our experiences. We have another friend who also has a son who’s autistic. And, you know, they have both both of their children are older than my my daughter. And, you know, they’ve always given me tips, things to look for, you know, to remind me you are her advocate to help making sure I knew my rights and understood my rights as a parent of a special needs child. And matter of fact, one of the greatest communities that I found was a recommendation to a group on just social media. It was called Black Autism Moms. And I could not believe that when I joined this group about two years ago, I would be in a group of about 8000 women who share the same thing that I’m sharing. And we all have very similar stories. And it’s we share our triumphs. We share our disappointments. I mean, when one has a child that graduated and goes to college. Or does something great. We’re all excited together. If someone is having a challenge where we’re just there as a community to share resources, to tell them how they can get through this or some recommendations. So community is essential. And and I will say this, as a parent of an autistic child, we can you cannot do this alone. You absolutely cannot do this alone.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:15:21] Absolutely. And you know, during this process and use sharing and telling Camille’s story, what challenges did you face?
Carla Moultrie: [00:15:31] You know, initially, after I, you know, journaling, I knew that I was I wanted to write, but there was a part of me that wanted to protect her and didn’t know if it was necessarily even okay to share her story, since she couldn’t say yes, it’s okay, mom, to write a book about me. There was a part of me that was nervous about Do I want to share my child, her, her world with everybody? And I wrote the manuscript and I shared it with the publisher and she said, This is absolutely amazing. She shared that her and my illustrator had never they’ve done tons of children’s book books, but they’ve never done one with a special needs character. And as they began to tell me how they learned so much just by reading the manuscript, it’s a short 30 page book. They learn so much just about autism, things that they did not know, and it helped them just to see autism differently. And I knew then when they shared that to me, I knew that if it was a blessing to me and it was a blessing to them, I knew it would be a blessing to others. And in just the last two weeks that the book has been out, I mean, literally across the world, people have reached out and, you know, they purchased it on Kindle and they’ve gotten copies and their overwhelming response. Overwhelming. Yeah. It’s been it’s been a tremendous blessing. Yes, absolutely.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:16:52] And that you know, and that’s the blessing. And the blessing when you can create something that is going to impact the world and it’s bigger than you. And when you have that that brand or that brand promise and that is what are you going to commit to deliver time and time again to your readers, to the people who are impacted by autism? It’s bigger than you. Carla Yeah, and I think that it’s awesome that you have created a platform to share the story of a your child that can impact others, not only children with autism, but African American girls with autism. And how because representation matters. And to be able to go into a retail store or online and see someone who is as awesome as Camille is going to help them on their journey. So again, that’s a part of that brand promise and the community that you’re building with these other 8000 women, you’re sharing your story. And again, that just, just is a reminder to me that it is bigger than us. And when something is bigger and it gains the traction that you’ve gained, I mean, aren’t you the number one seller? Tell us about that.
Carla Moultrie: [00:18:22] Yes, I was the number one seller in my category the first week that the book has been out for two weeks. So I was the number one seller for the first week on Amazon and the categories for children’s books about disabilities. And and I’m just very I haven’t checked the ratings and the rankings this week, but I’m really excited about just being in two weeks, having that reaching that level of success. We’re already on book number two. This is this is going to be a series. I mean, our goal is to journal Camille’s life until she’s 18 years old. So she’s eight now, at least another ten books. Well, you will see another ten books talking about and sharing about her challenges, her development over the next 18 years. So I’m excited about this. I’m really, really excited about being able to share her growth and her development with everyone and just the world, because, as you said, representation does matter, just like other like African American women. A lot of times, you know, there’s their health disparities. A lot of times we don’t get the treatment that we are supposed to get. We’re often not taken seriously when we go into doctor’s offices. That happens also with little black girls. Right. And we saw that firsthand. It took almost a year to get a diagnosis. Three different opinions. And our daughter is clearly autistic. So, you know, we’re trying to bring awareness, not only just awareness about autism, but acceptance so that parents and people who engage other persons with autism and differences, they’re accepted. You know, I. I love the idea of the Special Olympics, but I also would like to see more spaces where we don’t have to exclude them if they’re if they are capable of engaging in other spaces. I would like to see more inclusivity in other spaces for our children.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:20:16] That’s a great point too. So that kind of takes me to vision. Having as the visionary of Awesome Girl. And you said you want to grow this over the next ten years and beyond. How can you help? What is going to be your greatest learning from your vision?
Carla Moultrie: [00:20:39] My greatest learning. I hadn’t thought about that.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:20:44] What have you learned so far through this process?
Carla Moultrie: [00:20:47] Well, one thing that I have learned is that you can never be prepared for the level of support that you can receive. I’ve literally had support come in from everywhere. I’m learning to manage it. Obviously, that that’s my my greatest learning is learning to manage it, trying to make sure that I take in the moment, you know, enjoy everything that’s happening. Enjoying the experience but also managing it, you know, interest, even vetting different opportunities because, you know, as every everyone wants to be associated with something great and something moving. That’s true. So, you know, just vetting those different opportunities as well. That’s probably my greatest learning experience right now.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:21:37] That’s really good, Carla. Like I said, you do have to be self aware. And, you know, like from your introduction to now, listening to your story, you do wear a lot of hats and you are in different communities. How do you manage? What is your self-care?
Carla Moultrie: [00:21:58] Oh, well, prior to launching the book, I had I had, you know, I had my typical massages once a month to my Mandy pedicures and going to the salon. But my husband literally told me two weeks ago, he’s like, Honey, we’re going to have to take probably every other weekend a Saturday, and just just pull back from everything. Just really just pull back because everyone is pulling I mean, everyone you’re having requests literally every day, right? All throughout the day. So we’ve decided that we’re going to take two Saturdays out of the month and we’re just going to just just pull back and just spend time with family. No social media.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:22:37] No social media, just, you know, just for that day. And I understand because it’s hard to pull away from the know social media, especially when you’re in the beginning phases of, you know, producing something great. You feel like you always have to show up. However, it is so important to be able to pull back and recognize what is important at the time. And so I think that is a great strategy that you and your husband have developed this saying, you know what, two days or two weekends out of the month, we owe that to ourselves so that we can continue to deliver on our brand promise. And if, you know, if we’re not recharged and re-energize, we cannot serve our community. So I think that it’s important to make sure that when you’re developing a plan of action, that you do incorporate self-care and managing and healing time to recharge so that you can continue on your life’s purpose.
Carla Moultrie: [00:23:36] And additionally, we are we’re looking to even just bring on some other additional support. You know, I’m looking to hire a virtual assistant, someone to assist me with some of these tasks that, you know, that I’m being pulled.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:23:48] Into and.
Carla Moultrie: [00:23:49] You know, even, you know, hiring more help with my daughter, you know, you know, currently I’m working remotely. So, you know, being at home has been been a blessing. But we we realize that even being at home, working remotely, picking her from school, we probably need some extra help now. Right? So looking into hiring a sitter, you know, to come a few days out of the week, you know, to be with her and to help support her as well, you know, while I while I can.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:24:17] While I live. Right, I’m curious to know. So what has been Camille’s response to all of the new gain attention?
Carla Moultrie: [00:24:24] You know, it’s so funny because when we first did the did the book and we were showing it to her and we were telling her that this was her, she just kept looking at it, just kept looking at it. And her teacher actually purchased a copy of it, and she didn’t say anything initially. And her teacher told me that when he showed her the copy of the book, she said, That’s me.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:24:46] That’s that’s me, that’s sweet.
Carla Moultrie: [00:24:48] So I was just like, wow. And every time she, you know, I have a copy of it on our kitchen table, on my dining room table, and she walks by every day. That’s me. That’s me. So she’s excited. I think she knows that she’s a little local celebrity.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:25:03] So she’s.
Carla Moultrie: [00:25:04] She’s excited. She a little girl at church came up to us last Sunday and said, I’m awesome girl, I’m awesome girl. And I have my book. So and Camille hugged the little girl and, you know, she’s that’s me. That’s me. So I’m excited. So I think she’s aware that she’s she’s getting some newfound attention.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:25:23] I know, you know, I look forward to logging in to social media and seeing the updates of her. I say Camille’s adventures. So now we’re going to look at the awesome girl adventures. I know that she has a a passion for Oreos. Oh, yes. So you’re in your series. You’re going to have to tell the Oreo stories.
Carla Moultrie: [00:25:45] Oh, yes. It’s so funny because we went to Publix last night on the way home from a little birthday party and, you know, Publix. I love you all. I really do. But when the Oreos are on sale, can we put them in the back of the store? Because every time we walk in when they’re on sale, like every other week, right. We walk in and she she sprints out and she looks back at me and she goes and grab her pack of Oreos. Oreos. I’m like, okay, let’s get a pack. And we probably have seven or eight packs of Oreos throughout the house hidden because she’ll eat a whole pack.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:26:18] Now, tell me it’s her favorite, the chocolate or the golden?
Carla Moultrie: [00:26:22] You know, the chocolate is her favorite, but she has. My mother in law just knew she would love the golden. So for a while she wouldn’t touch the golden. And then when she couldn’t find the chocolate, she, she just went to the golden. So she likes them both. But the chocolate is the favorite.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:26:37] Oh, that is awesome. I think. Like I said, I always look forward to see where the new hiding spots are for the Oreos. And then I think the other day the funny story was that you hit them in the oven, but then you preheated the oven. So now you have warm Oreos.
Carla Moultrie: [00:26:52] Yes. I completely forgot. My husband had hit him in the. And then I said, Why didn’t you tell me they were in the oven? You’re supposed to check the oven. You know, that’s a hot spot.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:27:01] So, yes, the the awesome stories of Camille. And I just think that it’s just such a blessing that you’re able to put a spotlight on. Ace a diagnoses or a subject that is, you know, sometimes often taboo and particularly in the African American community. And we we have our own perceptions around what special needs are. And for you to able to write a book that helps. Shine a light on how you can be awesome and how you can have. A diagnoses or disability, but still live. And you can still be the hero and you can still tell your story. So a lot of great things are going to come out of the Awesome Girl series and, you know, as entrepreneurs and future authors, as they hear the podcast and the rebroadcast of it, Just to be encouraged. And what advice would you give to someone who is probably they have a vision they don’t necessarily know how to implement because you’ve produced the book, you’ve become the number one best seller. But if they’re not as far as along on the journey as you are, how would you advise them?
Carla Moultrie: [00:28:25] I would advise them to do the research that one of the things that I did when I knew that I wanted to to write a children’s book and seeing with my mother in law sending me books, I was I started ordering books as well. I started learning how children read and understand. You know, that was my biggest thing. I said, I want it to be I want it to be very easy reading. I didn’t want it to be clinical because I did find some books about autism, some children’s book about books about autism. But to me, I thought they were either not representative of my daughter or they were a little bit too clinical for a seven or eight year old. I wanted it to be very easy reading. I wanted kids to be able to understand when they read the book, so they’ll say, Oh, that’s why Jane does this, or That’s why Tommy does that, so that they would understand. And doing doing your research, you will you won’t be able you won’t go wrong because you you will learn how to do what is whatever it is that you’re trying to do. And that’s why that’s one of the reasons I think that Awesome Girl has been such a success in this these last two weeks is that it’s easy reading.
Carla Moultrie: [00:29:40] You know, I’ve had medical professionals, clinicians, autism experts, ABA therapists, specialists, you know, ordered the book and said, this is absolutely amazing. This is absolutely amazing. And matter of fact, her nurse practitioner at the Marcus Autism Center has a copy of it and she says, we’re going to have to get multiple copies of this. This is amazing. You did an amazing job, you know, penning this you know, this is this is this is easy. This is easy. It helps people understand. And that’s what I wanted to do. And I think that’s what piece of advice I would give others who are in particular authors, you know, who are wanting to write a children’s book or any other book, you know, do your research that that will be key to your success. And and if you’re an entrepreneur, pace yourself. Don’t you know you’re not in a race against everybody else? You know, you don’t have to be number one tomorrow. You don’t have to feel like you’re you know, you’re competing with everybody else. Just race yourself. Yeah. And pace.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:30:40] Yourself. I always tell entrepreneurs, no matter how long you’ve been on the journey, you have to trust the process. And no matter what it looks like, be mentally prepared to pivot and to go with the flow and trust the process. And you know, here with she sparks and sparks stories, we are all about community as well. And Carl, I would like to know, how can we support you as a community?
Carla Moultrie: [00:31:10] Honestly, I think just educating yourself first on autism and what it is and what it is not. One of the things that I’ve learned about autism in particular is that years ago, autism was considered mental mental retardation. That’s that’s essentially what it was. We heard it growing up. I mean, I didn’t know many people that were considered mentally retarded when I was growing up, but I knew a couple of people, but I didn’t understand it. I just thought they were different. And one thing that I have learned in that we’ve learned as is is a world is that autism is not one dimensional. It really is a spectrum. It really is a spectrum. You can have a very, very low functioning person who will really need care and support their entire life. And then you have people who are very, very high functioning. Albert Einstein was autistic, you know, so and we’ll do great and wonderful things as we know. We’ve we’ve seen that there have been people who’ve gone to college who’ve earned law degrees, medical degrees, who are who indeed are autistic. And and that autism is definitely a spectrum. As I said, you can be very low functioning to very high functioning to somewhere in the middle. But at the end of the day, those people still are people. They deserve respect, they deserve empathy, they deserve dignity and find a way to support and encourage them and. Find a way to support and encourage their families as well. Right. Because it’s not it’s not an easy journey. We make a lot of adjustments to our our lives every day. Caring for children and adults with autism.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:32:57] Thank you. How can we find out more about Camille as an awesome girl?
Carla Moultrie: [00:33:03] Oc Well, you can follow her on social media. She’s on Facebook as awesome girl. She’s on Instagram as awesome girl books. And you can just follow me. Carla Moultrie. I’m. I’m Carla Moultrie. On Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. So you can follow me in all places on LinkedIn, you can follow me. And I’m sharing our journey on all of my platforms. So please follow the page. Awesome girl books on Instagram and Awesome Girl on Facebook or Carla Moultrie on all social media platforms.
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks: [00:33:38] Well, Carla, thank you for sharing who you are, what you do, and why your brand matters. Again, here on Spark Stories, we celebrate business owners. And today and every day, listeners, please remember to support local businesses and express your support on their social media platforms. And again, thank you for tuning in.
Intro: [00:34:01] Thank you for listening to Spark Stories. If you’re looking for more help in gaining focus, come check out our website where you can find episode show notes, browse our archives and access free resources like worksheets, trainings, events and more. It’s all at WW she.
About Your Host
Dr. Clarissa J. Sparks is a personal brand strategist, trainer, mentor, and investor for women entrepreneurs. She is the founder of She Sparks, a brand strategy design consultancy.
Using her ten-plus years of branding & marketing experience, Dr. Sparks has supported over 4,000 women entrepreneurs in gaining clarity on who they are, what they do, and how they can brand, market, and grow their businesses. Using her Brand Thinking™ Blueprint & Action Plan she gives entrepreneurs the resources and support they need to become the go-to expert in their industry.
Follow Dr. Clarissa Sparks on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
