MERIDIAN TOWNSHIP - Anthony Ianni... a name that's known all throughout the Okemos and East Lansing area not only as a popular basketball player and for his size but also for his inspirational words of wisdom and astounding kindness he spreads to those he meets.

Ianni stopped by the studio the other day to give us his story on bullying and how you can prevent it whether its you or someone you know who is being bullied.

Growing up, the kindhearted basketball star overcame a series of adversities from being teased about his height to being taken advantage of through his autistic spectrum disorder. This didn't stop him from achieving his life goals whatsoever. When he was diagnosed with ASD (autistic spectrum disorder) he was 4 years old. He had a difficult time understanding things such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, sarcasm and ended up taking things that people said very seriously. This lead to him being easily taken advantage of by bullies growing up.

Along with being diagnosed with ASD, he was also extremely tall growing up. By the age of 11 he stood at 6'0 tall and wore size 13 shoes, which people were just not used to seeing. Ianni now stands at 6'9 which benefitted him in his pursuit of basketball but was also an outlet to escape the real world and all the problems that he was faced with.

Whenever Ianni faced troubling times he would always seek out the help and advice from his close friends and family.

"Whenever I was having a difficult time I would turn to my family for guidance especially my father. He told just to just block out the noise and just keep being who you are and if that don't work out just drown people with kindness and that the one thing that I think really helped me over come a lot of it."

Ianni was apart of the GVSU basketball team his first 2 years of eligibility before he transferred to MSU, where the basketball team won the 2012 Big Ten Tournament. Nowadays Ianni is a National Motivational Speaker for the Michigan Department of Civil Rights and goes around telling people his story, giving advice and knowledge to people about how bullying can affect everyone and if you or someone you know is being bullied, to stand up and be a solution than a bystander.