I know it's bad grammar to start sentences with because...but
Because I dared to disagree, the someone I disagreed with has come back to me with a very positive response about my need for my disabilty to be accepted. Four words:
"I understand better now."
Because I have spent the past few months with brilliant support online through blogging and learned much about the Social Model, I have been able to articulate my views on my disability to someone close to me, outside blogging, for the first time.
This is a milestone. I feel jubilation and I want to share it. It's not a self-satisfied jubilation, not even about 'educating the able-bodied', just genuine happiness that someone important to me 'understands better'.
Because I am finding my way, and because I know I am not alone, it gives those who know me the chance to start making sense of what has been a very difficult time all round. Sudden disabilty can send out shock waves. And those shock waves can rebound for years. A personal trauma becomes a shared trauma. A collective sense of disbelief.
Sometimes things have to utterly fall apart to be put back together again, differently. But the sense of rebuilding is such a positive force.
These are positive times indeed. You may have noticed the appearance of a new Ouch! button left and up a bit. Blogging at Ouch! is going to be a driving force for me in the next few weeks. Six of us are posting regularly on disability matters. I will be back here in between. You'll find us all at Ouch's weblog.
Or just click the Ouch! button on the sidebar anytime to go to their homepage.
10 comments:
I am so pleased to read this! GO YOU!! :o)
Woo Hoo! I agree with so many of the things you're discussing here - particularly the power of our fellow bloggers in helping us understand ourselves in new ways. And, och, that feeling of being understood. Disabled or not, there isn't any feeling in the world any better than that.
Hi seahorse, I can't remember where I dropped in here from but I just wanted to say hi and I'm glad you've been able to explain these things to someone so they understand.
And that photo is beautiful.
Excellent! And remember this is your doing; you helped this person to better understand. That is an important achievement. :-)
Hurrah for SeaHorse ! A real step forward and a product of all teh hard work you've put in.
;-)
Thanks all. Am feeling very encouraged and more confident in myself. Maybe I should get a FAQ t shirt printed, or hand out pamphlets or something (maybe not :-), bit ott perhaps) but it's a good start anyway.
It's really rather exciting that so many folk I know are taking part in the OUCH guest blogger thing. I've not written for a while because I've been so enthralled by others that it almost seems superfluous. I'm very pleased you managed to bring your chum around. I was reading today that despite being titled the most influential disabled person does not consider himself disabled. Just as identities are fluid I think that the abled/disabled divide is more of a continuum than two separate things. Perhaps if we allow ourselves to view disability more open-mindedly we can break free of the shackles of negative connotations.
Fluttertongue, interesting point. I just think Gordon Brown doesn't have time to think through being disabled. He's a pretty detached guy from what I read, so this rejection is entirely in keeping with him being work-driven and pushing aside any areas of perceived weakness.
I agree with your view about our glorious new leader. He probably does see disability as a weakness and he is powerful so I bet he can get large print documents when ever he wants it, just like Blunkett can get stuff translated into Braille vey easily.
I the department I work in there was a pretty senior manager who became disabled. He always championed how the department supported him and provided him with his needs. Of course this had nowt to do with his position at all!!! Us mere mortals haave to wait an age for our needs to be met but he was alright jack so all was well with the world.
Mr Brown and powerful disabled people like him have to wake up and smell the roses.
Marmite Boy, well said. I do wonder if he is even prepared to use large print documents, because I think he is so in denial. I just don't think he would connect the word disabled to himself, and therefore he's not connecting with anyone with a disability, potentially. Time will tell.
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