Some of us are lucky enough to fall into careers that we love, where just coming to work is a joyful part of the day. Fewer have been purposeful, have seized the brass ring and gotten into those careers through hard work, perseverance and, yes, even a little bit of luck. The path to my dream career was decided by an entirely different kind of luck. A social worker who specialized  in helping children and adults with special needs, I had stability and my degrees in English and Psychology ensured the future of that stability. In fact, as a candidate for a Master’s Degree, all I needed was a bit of time and some creative budgeting, and the world – a world I had traveled extensively – would be my oyster.

My first visit to Dubai solidified my desire to work there; it was a dream job with all the bells and whistles that I wanted. Tax free USD, housekeeper, driver, return flights home during holiday season, child care … what else could I ask for?  But all of this stability was shattered when, at the age of 29, I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and was struck with the realization that my life would never be the same.

I became attuned to a world with following parameters :

• Canadians have one of the highest rates of multiple sclerosis in the world.
• MS is the most common neurological disease affecting young adults in Canada.
• Every day, three more people in Canada are diagnosed with MS.
• Women are more than three times as likely to develop MS as men.
• MS can cause loss of balance, impaired speech, extreme fatigue, double vision and paralysis.
• MS was first identified and described by a French neurologist, Dr. Jean-Martin Charcot, in 1868.
• We don’t know what causes MS but researchers are closer to finding the answer.

Armed with as much information as I could find, I had two choices: to get on with life or to allow the sadness to consume me. I chose to get on with life. Knowing that my best way forward was to take hold of that life and ensure that its direction was one of my own choosing, that MS was not going to control my future, I seized on a passion for travel that I had nursed since childhood. I became an entrepreneur in an industry where I have been able to carve out a significant niche, based on a personal philosophy that travel should be inclusive and not exclusive.

Seventeen years later, I am well-traveled and an expert at tailoring vacations for people with all types of disabilities, finding joy in showing people the travel opportunities that await in our beautiful world and creating dream vacations for those who thought dream vacations were for other people.  I believe in kismet, and perhaps my destiny did not lie in teaching in Dubai but in arranging travel to Dubai for someone with MS. Life has its own design and you just have to roll with it …

Tarita Davenock, MA/ CTC
Travel Professionals International
Phone: 250-585-5525; Toll Free: 1888-993-9295
Email Tarita

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