Help Miriam Build Her Own Unique Voice!

The Gift of Voice for Miriam

Friends, I’m asking you to help me give the gift of voice to Miriam. This beautiful young lady has got stuff to say! She’s witty, she’s hilarious, she’s a teenager!

I have so much love and gratitude for Miriam and her mom, Kira. They both radiate such genuine goodness and light. Their friendship has truly been such a refreshing gift in my life. I’d love so much for us all to be able to give them this gift in return.

Kira and I met in an online group for parents of kids living with dystonia. Our daughters are close in age and share the same diagnosis and many of the same daily struggles. One aspect of dystonia that they share is that they are both what I personally call, “semi-verbal.”

They can technically speak, but with great difficulty and not often very clearly. On their more difficult days, they sometimes cannot summon their voices at all and on many occasions, it can be difficult to understand their speech. They both use Augmentative & Alternative Communication communication devices (AAC), which they control with their eye-gaze to write, do school work, send emails/texts, and to communicate. It can be daunting enough just trying to use your eyeballs to type out what you want to say, but when it ends up sounding unnatural and robotic, that can be downright disheartening.

Right now, Miriam only has a few digital voices to choose from on her device, and none of them really suit her. She wants to sound like herself, not like a mature woman or a little girl. 

Thanks to a company called VocalID, Miriam CAN get a unique voice for her AAC that actually sounds like her!! VocalID (https://vocalid.ai/individual/bespoke/) has the technology to build "Bespoke Voices" for people who use text-to-speech devices. They will use a sample of Miriam's own voice and blend it with a matched donor voice, to literally create a voice for her that is her very own.

I’m so in love with the idea of donating voices and creating custom voices that actually sound like the person using the AAC, and reflect their personality and age! This is such a confidence booster and quite honestly, it's just humanizing. 

With so many additional medical-related expenses, the $1500 price tag of a personalized voice is steep. Kira has mentioned to me that she wanted to eventually get Mimi her own voice (created by combining her own voice with a donor voice) and how it would mean so much to both of them. I know they are in the process of updating Miriam’s AAC and this would be the perfect time to get a custom voice. I’m beyond excited to see Miriam’s reaction when she hears it! And now I’m crying! Let’s do this friends!!

Please check out the TED talk below to learn more about how VocalID is changing lives! You can even audition to donate your own voice to their voice bank!
https://youtu.be/d38LKbYfWrs