In Arlington, Va., a two-time Paralympic swimmer helps people with disabilities enhance and maintain their fitness by sharing her talents and knowledge. 

Gialamas founded AMG Fitness to provide online adaptive workouts for people with disabilities. She has arthrogryposis, which affects joint mobility in her hands and legs. She walks with assistance from braces that help support her.

“I went to London and Rio (Paralympic Games),” Gialamas said. “I swam Division One at Loyola University (Maryland). I’m from Chicago, and I started swimming at three. I retired from swimming at the age of 24. After London and Rio, I found myself in a position where COVID hit, and everything was going online. But no adaptive resources were hitting online, and I wanted to create a solution.” 

Following her swimming career, Gialamas realized there wasn’t a commonplace for people with disabilities to seek out exercise information. “That weird time in quarantine when everything went online and everyone was posting workouts in their living rooms,” she said. “As someone with a disability, I was like, there has to be something out there that has to be people doing this, and I didn’t find a lot of what AMG is for varying disabilities.”

For example, there are workout videos online for people in wheelchairs, but not necessarily for people like Gialamas with limited mobility issues.

“I really wanted to create a place for people to not only be athletes and feel really good in their bodies,” she said. “But also not be athletes and just feel really great in their fitness spaces.”

Gialamas’ exercise videos incorporate a lot of bodyweight exercises. For example, stationary jumping jacks, forward punches, and others involve lightweight dumbbells. “It’s all adaptive workouts, all free, and it’s all at home,” Gialamas said. “I don’t want people to have to pay for any of the workouts, so I rely on donations and strategic partnerships to keep AMG free.” Gialamas’ videos don’t coach a class; they offer instructions for exercises you can perform at home compared to other videos you might find on the internet.

Her dedication to helping others inspired Easterns Automotive Group.

“Hi, this is Joel Bassam at Easterns Automotive Group. I was amazed to learn about the AMG Fitness Foundation and Alyssa the way that you have turned your passion for fitness into a way to help others with adaptive workouts. It’s something that I think should be admired, and you are an inspiration to athletes all over the United States. We want to support this cause and increase your community size by donating $2,000 to the AMG Fitness Foundation so you can continue to share those workouts and keep everyone in shape. Keep doing the amazing work that you are doing.”

Gialamas was so pleasantly surprised by the generous donation from Easterns Automotive and was eager to start using it to help people in her community and far beyond.

“I am so shocked,” Gialamas said. “This will help so many people. There are so many fitness kits we can do with this money and the incredible things. I cannot believe the support I have got. Thank you so much.”

A local organization works tirelessly to support families who received the diagnosis or have children who are receiving treatment in local hospitals. Both Maryann Mayhood and Laura Tierney have experienced firsthand what it’s like to have a child with a heart condition. Mayhood’s son Joseph was born with Transposition of the Great Arteries (TGA), and Tierney’s son Lincoln was born with Tetralogy of Fallot with Pulmonary Atresia.

They call themselves heart moms and take pride in Mended Little Hearts (MLH), a nonprofit organization that helps families navigate life with child heart disease. Mayhood continued, “We stick together because no one else knows what you’re going through like a heart mom.”

Mended Little Hearts is helping families by providing resources, tools, and support. They transitioned from in-person visits to dropping off lunches and bravery bags during the pandemic. They partnered with Lost Dog Cafe, which helps to provide lunches to children and their families at children’s hospitals.

“To be able to have these lunches and have real food,” Tierney laughed. “No offense to the hospitals but it gets old, it really does.”

Joel Bassam with Easterns Automotive Group loves the organization’s work in the community.

“Our hearts were touched by the Mended Little Hearts program. This volunteer-led initiative is absolutely incredible. We want to support the bravery bags initiative by donating $2,000, so you can keep supporting these kids,” Bassam said.

“That helps so much. Thank you, Easterns!” Mayhood said in tears. “That goes so far. That’s what you get in a year, so that’s really big.”

The donation will allow Mended Little Hearts to continue feeding patients and their families.

Since Steve Park’s family-owned taekwondo studio in Northwest DC opened more than 25 years ago, Little Lights has served families with some of the lowest incomes in Washington, D.C.

After Steve met a young kid who struggled with reading, he felt heartbroken for students who needed help in school and a mentor relationship.

Now, Little Lights offers a variety of after-school programs for hundreds of children between the ages of 3 and 18 years old, including tutoring, mentoring, and more.

When there was a school teacher shortage last summer, Little Lights was there to help D.C. families in need.

With Little Lights’ help and support, all six of her children will pass, said Kourtney Mills, a mom of six.

Little Lights recently launched a college and career readiness program, which assists students in enrolling in college and setting them up for success after graduation. In addition, Little Lights offers job training to adults. Since its founding, the non-profit has grown beyond just a program. It has become an integral part of the community in the process.

“We build deep relationships with families. We even hire adults from the community to come work and be employed at our center,” Park said. “We develop the relationship long-term. Even during the pandemic, we would call parents every single week and have zoom chats, provide tablets that have internet, and act as an extended family for our students and adults, so they do have that support system that they often lack. It’s very easy for students to fall through the cracks when that support system isn’t there, and the safety net isn’t there. We try to provide that level of depth and support for all of our families.”

Touched by the fantastic works Little Lights is doing in our community, we surprised them with a check for $2,000 to go towards their incredible initiative.

Park was extremely thankful for the generous gift from the Helping Hands initiative. “We are excited to put it into our career and college readiness program and help it to grow and help more students,” Park said. “This is wonderful. Wow. I’m so touched. It’s so generous. This will really help.”