Danielle Meyers still smiles when she recalls the moment she first noticed her husband, Shlomo Meyers, at summer camp more than a decade ago.

“He was standing on a rock, and as my camp was going back on the bus, I turned around,” the 34-year-old Los Angeles native told JNS. “It was love at first sight.”

Two years later, in 2014, the couple married under the chuppah and moved to Danielle’s hometown, where their life looks much like other Orthodox couples. They split household chores. They take long walks around their neighborhood. They unwind with their favorite movies.

They also both have Down syndrome.

The couple talked to JNS from the Los Angeles home of Danielle’s father, Terry Magady. The two described their marriage and what it took to build a life together at a time when romantic relationships involving people with disabilities were still uncommon in the Orthodox community. (February is Jewish Disability Awareness, Acceptance and Inclusion Month.)

Both Danielle and Shlomo said that they dreamed of getting married from a young age, even though they had almost no examples of Jewish couples with Down syndrome.

Danielle, who attended a mainstream, Haredi girls school in Los Angeles, said that marriage was a constant topic among her friends. Naturally, she assumed that she would marry too.

“In high school, all my friends were talking about marriage and shidduchim,” she told JNS, using the Hebrew term for matchmaking. “I saw a lot of my friends get married, and I felt it was time for me.”

Shlomo, who is 40 and originally from Chicago, said that he felt the same way.

He attended dozens of weddings, including those of his siblings, and often wondered when his turn would come. After his sister’s wedding he told his mother: “I’m next.”

“I had no idea how I was next,” Shlomo told JNS. “I’m emotional, which is not a bad thing. But there was a time I thought, ‘What would happen if I got married?’ Then I met Danielle and thought she was the one.”

Avromie Adler, international director of Yachad, told JNS that the Orthodox disabilities conversation has shifted in recent years, and inclusion is no longer only about schooling, programming or employment.

More families are asking about adult relationships, including marriage, he said.

“The ‘next level’ conversations I’m having with families, whether it’s the participants themselves or parents, revolve around one of two issues,” he told JNS. “One of them is long-term relationships, specifically marriage.”

That kind of expectation was far less common when Danielle was born in 1991, her father said.

Magady told JNS that he believed by the time his daughter was 1 that she would marry one day.

“Back then it was new. Nobody was doing it much,” Magady said. “I remember a Jewish professional, a nice person, telling me at a panel, taking off his glasses to make a point: ‘It will never happen.’ And he repeated: ‘It will never happen.’”

Magady and his wife Holly, pushed for Danielle to have as typical a childhood, and adulthood, as possible, sending her to regular schools throughout her life.

When she returned from two years in seminary in Israel, he began looking for a match. He made calls across the country, sometimes multiple a day, and reached out to organizations, including Yachad, to spread the word.

Many, he said, did not know what to do with the request.

“When I called organizations, it didn’t register,” he told JNS. “It was like I was talking about Mars.”

Some were confused, he said. Others warned him to “be careful.”

“But I wasn’t looking for warnings,” Magady said. “I just wanted help finding a match.”

Magady eventually found a matchmaker willing to take on the search. Danielle and Shlomo were soon arranged to sit next to each other at a dinner at Camp Lavi, an Orthodox summer camp with a Yachad program, where Danielle was working as a counselor.

They connected quickly, Magady said.

Nearly 12 years later, despite early bumps in the road especially during the pandemic lockdowns, the couple has settled into married life, Magady told JNS.

“They’re not a caricature,” he said. “They’re real people with real differences. Shlomo is very different from Danielle and vice versa.”

“He’s a cool guy. He has an amazing sense of humor,” Danielle said, of Shlomo. “He makes me laugh. We have the same personalities, but he’s also wise and punctual. That’s just how he was raised.”

At one point during their hourlong conversation with JNS, Danielle shared a personal detail about Shlomo that he didn’t want to appear in print. “Don’t say that,” he chided. Danielle assured her husband that she was only giving a “general overview” of their journey and wouldn’t go into further detail to protect his privacy.

Shlomo said they have been “shmoozing” more lately. They spend time with friends and talk at night before bed. They go to the movies, see musicals and head to the beach.

“We like being around people, and sometimes just ourselves,” he told JNS. “We both have a fear of the dark, and we both like socializing.”

The couple receives support from outside programs and organizations but lives independently.

In early February, Magady said, the two decided on their own to go to the beach to watch the sunset. Their families learned about it afterward, when they received a photo.

“They went to the beach, watched the sunset, asked a stranger to take a picture of them with a beach ball and then Ubered home,” Magady said. “That’s not orchestrated. That’s just their life.”

Magady said that perceptions in the Orthodox world around marriage for people with disabilities have shifted since Danielle got married.

“At a macro level, things have changed a lot,” he told JNS. “People call us now and say, ‘My son or daughter is dating. What do we do?’ Organizations acknowledge it’s real.”

Still, Magady said, misconceptions remain about what people with disabilities and special needs can do, and what kinds of adult lives they can build.

Historically, he said, communal attitudes have moved through phases, from hiding people with disabilities away, to institutions, to education and then to inclusion in community life.

Marriage, he told JNS, is the next phase.

“When people actually see Danielle and Shlomo out at a restaurant and talk to them, it changes perception,” he said. “It’s not just, ‘Nice they got married.’ It represents an entirely new expectation of what’s possible.”

JNS asked Magady if the couple has ever brought up the topic of having kids. He said that he preferred not to answer for the couple’s privacy.

Adler, of Yachad, told JNS that families often come to him with questions about dating and marriage after hearing about couples like Danielle and Shlomo.

Yachad can help families navigate the process, from dating through the early and ongoing adjustments of married life, he said. But the organization does not decide for families whether marriage is the right choice.

“We don’t see ourselves as deciding for people what is or isn’t right for them,” Adler said. “They make decisions. We lay out pitfalls to watch for and provide handholding where possible.”

Despite having multiple Yachad couples currently dating, Adler said he has not launched a formal matchmaking initiative, which would require a database of potential matches, professional matchmakers and significant funding. However, it is something he would like to build in the future.

“Right now,” he said, “the community doesn’t view it as a priority yet.”

“Attitudes change when people change,” he said. “This is an evolution driven by participants saying, ‘I want more,’ families believing and professionals helping deliver.”

Orthodox Jews, especially in Chassidic communities, have excelled in inclusion for people with special needs, according to Moshe Krakowski, a professor and director of doctoral studies at Yeshiva University’s Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration.

“The Chassidic community believes strongly in the intrinsic value of every person, and they don’t define people by ‘success,’” Krakowski, who studies Chassudic education in New York, told JNS.

“In that community, a person’s role as an eved Hashem, someone devoted to religious life, is more central than accomplishments,” he said.

“I once had a Chassidic father say that children with Down syndrome are the greatest nachas,” he added, using the Hebrew word for pride.

“With other kids, parents often put hopes and expectations on them, and they can be disappointed,” he told JNS. “With a child with Down syndrome, parents don’t have the same expectations, so they’re able to appreciate them for who they are.”

Danielle told JNS that she and Shlomo take marriage “day by day.”

The most important things, she said, are “patience and compromise.”

“Be patient,” she said. “Some people with special needs struggle with words. It takes time to get them out.”

Shlomo agreed.

“If you’re Jewish and were born with a disability, it doesn’t mean you cannot have a good future or cannot have a good life,” he told JNS. “Not everyone understands people with special needs.”

“It is not easy for anyone living with special needs or people born with Down syndrome,” he said. “Me, I’m good at communicating. That’s one of the many things I’m good with. But there are times it’s hard to understand. People need patience.”

“Our relationship is good, but it’s not always perfect,” he added. “We take care of each other. We joke around. We support each other through hard times.”

The post ‘I saw a lot of my friends get married, felt it was time for me,’ says Danielle Meyers, who has Down syndrome appeared first on JNS.org.