A heartwarming photo showing a reunion between a little boy and a professional soccer player who are both missing their left forearms has gone viral.
In April, 21-month-old Joseph Tidd’s father took him to the season opener for the Orlando Pride, a U.S. women’s professional soccer team in Florida. Following the game, Miles Tidd said they waited around to meet one player, in particular.
That player was Carson Pickett, a 25-year-old defender for the Orlando Pride who, like Joseph, was born without her left forearm.
Although the young boy didn’t know who Pickett was, Miles Tidd said it didn’t take long before the pair clicked.
“He saw Carson’s arm and I think Carson had pointed to her arm and then pointed to his and said something like ‘We have the same arm,’” Miles Tidd recalled during a telephone interview with CTVNews.ca on Tuesday.
“It was the ‘Aha’ moment. You can just see this look wash over Joseph’s face where he instantly stops and then he just stares at Carson, looks at her face, looks at her arm.”
After that moment, Miles Tidd said Joseph and Pickett spent the next half hour playing and laughing.
“He didn’t want to leave her side. He realized in that moment who she was and what made her special is also the same thing that made him special,” he said. “You could definitely tell they kind of made that bond right there and then.”
Joseph’s father also said he had the opportunity to speak with Pickett’s parents, who attend all of her games. He said her father gave him one important piece of advice that he’s tried to incorporate in his own home.
“Carson’s dad said he never allowed her to say ‘I can’t.’ He just said ‘You can. We’ve just got to find a way,’” Miles Tidd said. “I thought that was pretty neat.”
Following that first meeting with Pickett in April, the Tidd family has met the soccer player on two more occasions.
On the third time, in early June, Joseph’s mother Colleen Tidd snapped several adorable photos of her son greeting Pickett after the game.
In one of the photos, which has since gone viral, Pickett can be seen leaning over the seats to give Joseph a fist bump. In that image, and several subsequent ones, Joseph is shown with a huge smile on his face.
Although the photo was first shared in early June on Joseph’s Instagram account, it really gained attention when it was widely circulated on various social media sites on Sunday.
“It’s brought so much awareness to those who aren’t familiar with the limb difference community,” Colleen Tidd said. “We’ve had so many people message us saying ‘Hey, I look just like Joseph. I didn’t know there was a community out here.’ So those are the moments that I absolutely cherish.”
Miles Tidd said Joseph’s bond with Pickett and his earlier introduction to Seattle Seahawks linebacker Shaquem Griffen, who had his left hand amputated when he was a child, will give him people to look up to when he’s older.
“Obviously, Joseph doesn’t understand how hard it is to do what they have done, but we do,” he explained. “Having examples like that reinforces that idea that ‘I can’t’ is really not something that he should even think about.”
Until then, the Tidds say Joseph is content to play with any ball he can find in the best way that suits him.
“I just want people to realize that no matter the way that you look. It really doesn’t matter. You’re able to accomplish it all. You might just do it a little differently,” Colleen Tidd said.
