Life & Work with Ashley Zazueta of Lancaster, Ca

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ashley Zazueta

Hi Ashley, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
I’m a mother of two boys. My oldest is Sebastian (6) and Maximillian(4). Sebs was diagnosed at 22mo old with Fragile X Syndrome(FXS)/autism(ASD). Fragile X Syndrome, is an inherited condition affecting intellectual, behavior, and social development. This can occur in both males and females who have full mutation. He fueled a fire in me to become an advocate not only for him but for our FX community. FXS is the most common single gene linked to autism.
I decided to completely dedicate my personal instagram to him back in 2020 and share his story/ours; what it’s like to be a parent to a child with a disability and his challenges day-to-day. Sharing a life that we didn’t know how to navigate with our son, doing therapies; early intervention, child development, occupational therapy, speech therapy, physical therapy, ABA therapy. It was a lot. My intention with sharing was not only to help bring awareness but if that meant another parent was going to come across our profile and feel less alone than that’s all that mattered. Sebastian looks “normal” to society but he struggles a lot and my job is to bring awareness to our society. I have slowly grown my instagram and through that platform I have met so many beautiful families that are going through similar journeys and has also helped me cross paths with people I never thought I was going to-having the privilege to share our story with others who have found me through instagram. Not only am I mama/advocate — I do photography on the side because it brings me so much joy to be able to freeze moments for others. That passion started with my oldest son. I wanted to document his life (we didn’t have a diagnosis yet). Once we received Sebastian’s diagnosis I took a brake from wanting to photograph because it took so much time.
Fast forward here I am sharing his story all because I took social media serious and have dedicated a lot of my time to it. Now, I am able to dedicate my time to both—advocating/content creating on social media and being a photographer.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
This all has definitely been a learning experience. Trial and error, wanting to give up. I think that’s honestly with anything you do in life, you learn as you go. You grow through failure.

I think one big experience that has stuck with me unfortunately, is encountering ignorance in society when it comes to my son and his disability in public. We have encountered many stares and rude comments.

That’s what gives me the motivation to keep pushing and sharing. Spreading awareness. That’s not going to stop us from showing my son the world and him experiencing the beauty there is out there.

Also, being a mother to a neurotypical and neurodivergent child has been a challenge and as Max gets older it’s a little bit of a struggle. I know with time and as he gets older it’ll be easier to explain things as to why certain things are different for his big brother. But, I honestly can’t complain because despite the struggles we’ve come across with their brotherhood — Max is the absolute best little brother and is always willing to try and help and learn to the best of his ability.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Being an advocate @jullianazazueta #oursebsjourney and a photographer @jullianasphotography on instagram.

I am most proud of being a mother and being able to voice for my son who is not fully verbal. Being able to show Mamas that no matter how hard things can get you can still create time for yourself. I am doing just that by also making time for my photography passion.

What are your plans for the future?
My goal behind this is to become a motivational speaker/public speaker. Get on stages and share with schools, communities, medical staff, mom re-treats, and continuing to share on social media the good and the bad about disabilities. The beauty there is.

Becoming a well-known public figure/influencer. In both my role as an advocate and capturing photographs. Creating lifetime memories.
I currently have something brewing career wise and I am very excited about it!
Crossing my fingers to start a podcast and be able to dive deeper and heal the journey I’m on as a mother to a child with extra needs and all the things in-between.

So, stay tuned!
Thank you for taking the time to read and please feel free to follow our journey on social media. We’d love to have you!

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jullianazazueta?igsh=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA%3D%3D&utm_source=qr