YPSILANTI, Mich. – A 12-year-old girl from Ypsilanti is proving she can do anything she sets her mind to doing.
Khara Gilmore is amazing and she has a national title to prove it.
This past August, Khara represented the state of Michigan for the title of Miss Amazing, a pageant for girls and women of all ages with different disabilities. Or as Khara likes to say, “other abilities.”
I met Khara while volunteering to be a buddy at the Miss Michigan Amazing pageant last April. Guiding her on stage and off was a new experience for me, but in true Khara form, she put me right at ease.
“You did amazing. Like she didn’t even need training to help me,” Khara said. “Like a lot of people like need training and she didn’t need any training. She just knew how to help me. It just came immediately to her.”
What started as buddies for a day, turned into buddies for life. And after winning the state title it was off to Nationals in Chicago together.
Competing in interview and evening gown, it was Khara’s talent that brought the audience and judges to tears and brought home the crown to Michigan.
Khara’s journey has not always been easy, for her or her mother Jennifer Joseph. A first-time mom who didn’t initially realize her beautiful baby girl had been born completely blind.
“Probably around four months old, I started to notice some differences in her vision. She wasn’t responding to faces, she wasn’t smiling. She wasn’t playing with things that were hanging over her head. So I went to an appointment in the morning at about four and a half months old and I expected her to go home with a patch, you know, maybe have like weak eye muscles, and possibly need surgery down the line. He started using some of his instruments, and he said, ‘I don’t think she can see it all.’ I was devastated,” she recalled. “You don’t know how she’s gonna navigate the world without sight, because it’s a very visual world. And so it was definitely scary trying to figure out what I needed to do to help her and have the best, fullest possible life that she could.”
With support from family, including Nana and Uncle Chris, both educators, Khara has found her way in a sighted world. She’s exceeded all expectations, especially when it comes to music.
“She was very interested in music at an early age she could kind of pick out sounds and harmonize,” Jennifer said. She has perfect pitch. So she can listen to a song and tell you what key it’s in.”
Khara is an active 6th grader. She walks alone with the help of her cheekily named cane “CiCi.” She’s also on the school’s track team with the help of a guide runner. Something her mom never imagined possible.
So what’s next for the amazing Khara Gilmore?
“Well, in the next three to five years, I’d like to I two things that I’ve definitely wanted to do I wanted to do so badly in these years, is I like to meet Beyonce and Stevie Wonder,” Khara said. “I like both of them and Stevie Wonder is actually from here, so someone might be watching this and have a connection to him. But also, like, Beyonce might be watching this video and be like, she wants to meet me.”