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Darius Huggins is seventeen, a senior at Southeast Raleigh Magnet High School, and the kind of kid who calls his mom every day at lunch just to check in. He's got A's and B's. He plays keyboard by ear, no lessons, just listens to a song and plays it back. He's outgoing, talkative, and genuinely handsome. He is also on the autism spectrum.
With prom approaching, Darius was trying to find a date. He asked one girl, then another, then another. They all said no.
"When he kept getting turned down, it was kind of breaking my heart," his mother, Max'ine Huggins, told me.
She encouraged him to keep trying. There was still time. But one evening in the kitchen, while her husband, William, or Chef Will, was cooking, Darius turned to her and said something she didn't expect.
"Mommy, won't you just go?"
She laughed. Moms don't go to prom, she told him.
He didn't miss a beat. "You love to dance. We can eat. And I can still talk to my friends."
And right there, standing in her kitchen, Max'ine felt something shift — not just for her son, but for every parent who has ever watched their child face a world that wasn't quite designed for them. The name came to her instantly: Moms on Proms.
Her husband turned around from the stove. "You need to do something with that."
So she did.
I came across Max'ine in a community Facebook group. She was a mom in the Triangle preparing a prom send-off for Darius and gathering community support to make it special. Something about her energy stopped me mid-scroll. I reached out immediately, and within five minutes of talking to her, I understood why.
Max'ine Huggins is an effervescent powerhouse. Originally from North Philadelphia, she started a catering empire with Chef Will at twenty-four. Their company, Married to Events, ran for eighteen years. "Because we were married and we were doing events, and I just combined them," she told me, and that's Max'ine in a nutshell: she sees a thing, she names it, and she builds it. She launched the Triangle's first mobile charcuterie cart. She founded Entrepreneur Chick, a nonprofit teaching women to start businesses with little to no funding. She started Own Something Academy to bring entrepreneurship education into schools. She has a background in electronics engineering.
But none of that is why I'm writing this story.
I'm writing it because as a fellow mom of a child with special needs, I sat across from a woman who is not only an advocate for her son, she is trying to make the world better for my son, too.
Max'ine's vision for Moms on Proms is straightforward: make prom night safe, inclusive, and joyful for teens with autism and other disabilities — by making space for the people who know them best to be part of the celebration.
"We don't have to be on the dance floor dancing," she says. "But we can be there for comfort."
For parents navigating sensory overload, meltdowns, or self-regulation challenges in crowded, loud, unstructured environments — prom night can feel less like a celebration and more like a risk. Max'ine wanted Darius to have the experience every teenager deserves. And she wanted to be close enough to help if he needed her.
The school principal initially declined to let her attend the prom itself. She was gracious about it, and she's patient. "That's my mission, that they will change their mind and let this be an inclusive thing for proms."
On April 18th, the Huggins family gave Darius a send-off. Family came from Philadelphia and South Carolina. Chef Will fired up the grill. Max'ine built an arch and a balloon backdrop. There was a red carpet. There were reporters.
And then a black 2026 Cadillac Escalade pulled up. The driver — a local vendor who heard what Max'ine was doing and dropped his rate to seventy-five dollars — opened the door. Darius stepped out in a royal blue brocade jacket with crystal-studded lapels, matching blue suede shoes, and sunglasses.
Max'ine rode with her son to the venue. She did the handoff to a trusted staff member, rode home with Chef Will, and waited — knowing Darius was safe, celebrated, and exactly where he was supposed to be.
"It made him extremely happy," she told me. "He kept asking me, 'Mommy, did you get your dress back?'"
Darius was diagnosed with autism as a toddler. A doctor once told Max'ine and William that he would never communicate in full sentences.
"God showed him," Max'ine says. "Because you can sit and have a full-blown conversation with Darius."
They made a decision early on: "We're not going to treat him different." They parented him with the same expectations as any child — chores, accountability, structure — while staying sensitive to his needs. Today, he reads above grade level and teaches himself keyboard by ear. He also has a seven-year-old sister named Dior who, by all accounts, keeps everyone on their toes.
What happened after prom night moved fast. Within a week, already armed with a logo, Max'ine had a website — momsonproms.com — and was receiving local media coverage from WRAL, CBS17, and HipHopNC. A radio feature followed. She has already received national media attention, with a feature headed for People magazine. She is working to secure a trademark, establish a 501(c)(3), and build the partnerships that will turn one prom night into an annual tradition — including a standalone prom for students with disabilities and their families.
None of this surprises me. This is what Max'ine does. She sees a gap, she names it, and she fills it at a speed that would exhaust most people.
As I listened to her tell me about raising Darius, about the prayers her husband prayed over their children, about the moment her son asked her to dance, I kept thinking the same thing: this is a woman who didn't just advocate for her own child's right to a safe and joyful evening. She's building something so that other children, children like mine, can get that same celebration.
This is one of many stories I want to tell, and I hope you'll share it with someone who needs to hear it.
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Learn more: momsonproms.com Contact: [email protected] Photos courtesy of Vision 6 Productions
April is Autism Acceptance Month.