Ezdan Fluckiger had been treating patients in his small Wyoming town since 1999 when he began asking himself a question that kept him up at night: What would happen to his daughter Eleanor when she grew up?
Eleanor has Down syndrome. When she started high school, he and his wife wanted to make sure she could have an independent life and a real job. Then he remembered something he had always loved: baking. He searched online for baking schools, and the first one that came up promised to teach people how to start a bakery in just 20 days. He was hesitant. Even so, he traveled to Oregon, where instructor Marda Stoliar taught him, one-on-one, everything he needed to know. He completed the program without leaving his practice and started selling bread from his home.
He opened the shop in 2015, a year before Eleanor graduated. “He was terrified”, he admits. Today, at 24, she runs the cash register, gets along wonderfully with her coworkers, and is known throughout town. One dad turned his fear into flour so his daughter would have a place where no one doubted what she could achieve.
