Patricia Simon

Patricia Simon was born with a cleft lip and palate. She is now a nurse, a public speaker, a patient advocate, and a writer. She has a great partnership with Children’s Craniofacial Association (CCA Kids) where she is a Speakers’ Bureau member.

Patricia has just finished another book in her children’s series on children with craniofacial differences. The book is called “Simon and Patty Go To Camp” and it is the fourth in her series. You can read about her entire series here.

The first book was published in 2018 and it was translated into Tagalog for a speech camp in the Philippines organized by SmileTrain. Two other books followed, each filled with beautiful images, songs, and the same message of acceptance and kindness.

Patricia explains that her motivation to write these books was because she couldn’t find many when she was first looking for books as a means of support for her own experiences. In response, she decided to write her own. It was an opportunity to give back to her community, show others that its okay to be different, and how differences should be embraced.

Simon and Patty Go To Camp

This book shows Simon (a cardinal who has a cleft beak), Patty (Simon’s friend with a craniofacial difference), and Patty’s sister Abigail, at a camp for kids as well as animals who have craniofacial differences. The camp is meant to mimic CCA Kids Annual Family Retreat. Patricia includes CCA staff members and community members throughout the book.

The book is meant to show how powerful community can be for those with these differences. It is also meant to emphasize how influential self acceptance can be.

CCA is helping to facilitate the distribution of these new books by including them in their care packages to children facing surgery, to education centers who are using their anti-bullying curriculum, as well as craniofacial medical centers. You can email Khadija Moten to request a copy of the latest book.

You can read more about CCA and Patricia’s new book here.