“if there were a cure for your disability, would you take it?”
Recently I’ve been having a little bit of disability related angst. A lot of times people ask me “If there were a cure for your disability, would you do it?”
It’s true that my disability is a burden to me sometimes, but not in a way most people would think. I think people assume that I would want to be cured so that I could walk or drive or do things like that. But really the biggest hurdle to me is the social stigma surrounding disability. People only pay attention to people with disabilities if they can use them as inspiration, porn, or as cute little sidekicks to boost their ego, but as soon as they get bored they just kind of cast us aside and move on. I wish that people wouldn’t patronize me, I wish that people would be attracted to me, or not act like they deserve a special place for being attracted to me. I wish that they would take me as seriously as an adult, because I’m 24 years old and people still talk to me like I’m a small child.
It’s not so much that I want to be able-bodied, but I would kill to just have 10 minutes to not be perceived as disabled. Just 10 minutes. Because sometimes it really does wear you down and it is really upsetting. You can’t just pick and choose which parts of someone are salvageable and make a new person out of that because that’s just not how life works. My disability has influenced every other aspect of my identity. So, if you reject my disability you reject every other part of me.
I feel like the issue at the crux of that whole cure question is “Would you rather exchange your disability if you could have a wholeness of your humanity instead?” but I would counter that my disability is my humanity. Just because someone is disabled that doesn’t automatically mean that their quality of life must be inherently less than an able-bodied person. I have more strength and wisdom and experience in my pinky finger than most able-bodied people do in their entire body.
So if you wouldn’t mind please kindly take your shitty eugenics hypothetical elsewhere! My body does not need a cure. Society’s attitudes do.
Tag: disability
I think what non-spoonies tend to forget is that chronically ill people do not just get ill more often than other people, but are ill all the time. When we miss school or cancel appointments, it is not because we ‘felt a bit peaky again’ and decided to not go – we feel bad most of the time, but still do things anyway. A lot of us feel ill, in pain etc. all the time, and we cancel plans/take time off when we physically or emotionally cannot cope with the day or the things required of us. Our ‘good’ or ‘okay’ is a healthy person’s ‘awful’. We are consistently making more effort than ‘normal people’ in order to live and make a living, and we often make that effort at the expense of our health. And it is so hurtful and offensive when people we know/ friends/ family/ teachers etc. get frustrated and annoyed because they think we are not trying hard enough. We are always trying. We are always fighting. Sometimes it’s too much.
The hallmark feature of ADHD has always been the inconsistency. Inconsistent engagement, inconsistent performance, inconsistent moods, etc. Activities that were done beautifully yesterday are terribly done today. Usually this is presented in a very judgmental way that the person with ADHD is ‘flighty, unreliable, unpredictable, or intentionally not trying.’
Adult and Teen ADHD Information, Dodson ADHD Center (via crylie)
i will say it again!!!
belittling “cute” self care is ableist!! telling others theyre doing self care wrong is ableist!! making people feel bad for doing “cute” self care is ableist!!!
policing how neurodivergent & disabled people give themselves small pleasures in life is ableist!!saying that “cute” self care is ineffective because you think neurodivergent & disabled folks shouldnt give themselves breaks for small pleasures is ableist!!
theres a huge misconception that “cute” self care promotes the idea that mental illness & disability is all fairy lights and warm blankets and that we should be exempt from all responsibility and i want everyone to throw that bullshit idea out right now
self care is giving yourself a break when you need it. self care is learning to not force yourself until youre at your breaking point. self care is letting yourself have small pleasures. self care is being kind to yourself.
if you have an issue with neurodivergent & disabled people enjoying their damn “cute” self care in an ableist world that gives us little to no understanding or accommodation. then you have the same bullshit mindset abled-bodied neurotypicals have and your opinion is harmful
and you also do NOT have to choose between “cute” self care and responsibility !!!!!!! you dont have to pick one!!!
Hoe Tips: Depression Edition
So you wanna up your hoe game, but also everything is impossible and you want to die? This is the post for you!
1. Embrace the shittiness. Don’t accept it, strive for recovery, but embrace your limitations because self-love is a core value of successful hoeing.
2. You want to look hot as fuck but also you can’t wash yourself because basic hygiene is TOO HARD RIGHT NOW. Invest in mamma’s little helpers: dry shampoo and face wipes (broke ho version: baking soda and baby-wipes). You can do your hair and wash your face in like .2 seconds. You can even do it in bed. Amazing.
If doing your hair is NOT going to happen today: just throw that shit in a. a bun b. a side braid. There ya go. Rotate as needed and throw in a bandanna or headband every now and then. Nobody knows you are dying inside.
3. Your look needs to be on point but you are currently a gutter trash animal inside. Don’t even worry! Get yourself some trusty black leggings, comfy sweaters, and large boots. Sleep in these leggings and sweaters. Wake up. Put feet in large boots. Outfit sorted. The large boots are key, because a. they hide your mismatched/dirty/missing socks, b. they pull the outfit together. This can actually look super on-purpose with pretty much any style. In the summer time, sleep in your undies and then pull of a comfy dress and boots. You can do this pretty much every single day by spicing things up with a scarf or cardigan or what have you and no one really notices.
4. You need to be on that eating shit, because an unhealthy ho is an unhappy ho. When I’m doing well, I cook all sorts of yummy healthy stuff. But when I get depressed my brain is like, “Um, no.” I’ve learned the safest bet for me is to buy food that I will actually eat and ignore what your grocery bag is “supposed” to look like. There have been month long periods where all I buy is cereal and popcorn. I supplement with fruit and salads when I can. That’s okay, just feed yourself. My best ho tip is to stock up on granola bars that you like. I got through three months of this semester by eating a Clif or Laura bar for every meal during my classes/bus/in bed. Its cheap and its easy and it means you aren’t skipping meals.
Also, buy a water bottle and drink out of it as much as humanly possible.
5. Take your birth control, anti-depressants, vitamins, and whatever else at the same time every night. Put then on your nightstand next to a large jar of m&m’s. Take the pills, eat some m&m’s, have an easier time sleeping knowing that your basic health needs are taken care of.
This is perf!
You’re an angel.
This is really sweet and considerate. A lot of people have no idea how hard it is for people with mental health issues. You are truly a Goddess!
This truly makes me feel like shit isn’t impossible and clearly the person who made tjis has been there done that no judgment so blunt you could smoke it but at the same time it sounds like someone actually cares for once
When Mona went to Radley. My thought was we are meant to be creating a tv show that’s based in reality, and I started to hear them speak of mental illness in a way that I really didn’t like. I started to hear a lot of references, to ‘the nut house’, ‘the crazies’, ‘the loons’ and that is something that is very personal to me. So one day I went into the writers room and I said, I have experience with mental illness and I just want to say that this doesn’t sit with me well. And to be honest if you’re going to talk about Mona ‘cracking up’, after the kind of pressures you’ve put on these girls– they should all be having their own mental breakdowns and we should be exploring that not mocking it. And it was kind of great because everything in the writers room just stopped.
Actual Angel Troian Bellisario (via fuckyeslittleliars)
there are a lot of reasons i hate the idea of ”despite their disability” but one of the biggest is how it separates our disabilities from the uniqueness of our lives
people like stephen hawking have spoken about his illness focusing his thinking, leading to some of his greatest work; artists like toulouse-lautrec, frida kahlo, basquiat, van gogh – their disabilities were a vital part of the genius of their art; scientists like turing and einstein definitely had extraordinary ways of working, in part, because of their diverging neurotypes; monet created his famous water lilies in largely blue hues because, in his vision loss, that’s mainly what he could only see, or how harriet tubman’s epilepsy would influence her work in the underground railroad and fervent dedication to enslaved africans
beethoven’s symphonies are unique for the lack of high notes that he could not hear, ray charles and stevie wonder’s playing was shaped by the fact that one hand had to play each key while the other simultaneously read music notes in braille, then memorize it by ear after learning it, or even memorize it just by hearing it – claudia gordon, dickens, francisco goya, tom wiggins…
so many disabled people who are lauded – and even ones who aren’t famous but are always talked about as amazing ”despite their disability” – are always treated as abled people with an awfully sad flaw, and the ways in which disability influences how we create and see the world are totally denied to us in that recognition
my talents go hand-in-hand with my being disabled, and often are a direct result of it in some way – they are not talents that grieve the ”tragedy” of my being disabled and attempt to erase it, they are talents that express and celebrate it
Daredevil On Netflix Is Now Accessible To Blind People: Netflix Adds Audio Description Support
Daredevil is now the first show on Netflix to use audio description technology that enables sight-impaired people to enjoy it. Now blind people can actually watch this show about a blind superhero – and a lot more than that, according to Netflix.
Daredevil On Netflix Is Now Accessible To Blind People: Netflix Adds Audio Description Support
“I want to make life easier for people in China who have disabilities. I know what it’s like, because I lived in a Chinese orphanage until the age of ten, and I wasn’t able to go to school because I couldn’t walk. But that’s just a small part of who I am. I want to be a diplomat, and travel, and do all sorts of things that have nothing to do with being disabled. I don’t want people to pity me. I don’t want to be another ‘poor her.’ I don’t want to inspire people. ‘Inspiration’ is a word that disabled people hear a lot. And it’s a positive word to you. But to us, it’s patronizing. I’m not living a wonderful life for a disabled person. I’m living a wonderful life, period. This morning I got accepted into the London School of Economics. Now hold on, let me put on some lip gloss before you take the photo.”
Are you against human euthanasia completely, out of interest? Like, the way they do it at Dignitas?
I know this is like a horrifying opinion in leftist circles but in our current society, considering the context of extreme ableism I just can;t support euthanasia, disabled people are pressured everyday to die, when we express a desire to, we should not then be killed, we should be offered help
We need to focus on how we can reduce pain for people, on how we can make people more comfortable, how we can uplift and make disabled people realise our lives are worth living etc, we do not need to make it legal to kill us
fivepercent 