#its okay to be disabled

[disablednotdifferent]

no, i’m not saying i can’t go to the store because i’m lazy, i’m saying it because i can’t feel my legs because of how much pain they’re in

no, i’m not saying i don’t feel up to the mall because i don’t want to see you, i’m saying it because i’m too ashamed to tell you i can’t walk right now

no, i’m not saying i don’t want to shower because i’m “gross” or “lazy”, i’m saying it because i don’t think i’d be able to hold myself up in there or raise my arms to wash my hair

no, i’m not saying i haven’t changed clothes in a few days because i’m “being lazy” or “being nasty”, i’m saying it because i’m tired and in too much pain to change my clothes by myself right now

STOP CALLING DISABLED PEOPLE LAZY OR GROSS FOR THINGS WE CAN’T CONTROL!!!!

a little reminder that you are not gross or lazy because of any of these things, you are just struggling more than usual and you know what? thats okay. don’t listen to anyone who tells you otherwise, you can’t control how many spoons you have in a day and that’s okay too.

don’t forget to love yourself a little today <3

[queerpunktomatoes]

This isn't something I really talk about on this blog but as someone who is chronically ill/mad, a lot of y'all stop caring about autonomy and a person's right to choose how to care for themself when it's an 3@t!ng d!s0r3r. (Yes, I'm pissed that I have to censor that, and I'm really sorry to people using screen readers.)

I've had this experience for over ten years now, and while I am so for people "choosing recovery" and sustaining hope, that's also not the only option or the only one that's somehow morally correct. Some of y'all are out here acting like I have absolutely no brain cells when I say that I'm not "in recovery." You act like I'm either "crazy" and therefore unable to rationally make a decision or I just have a d3@th wish. Neither is true.

The system royally screwed me and many other folks over. I was privileged enough to be in specialized treatment as a teenager, and obligatory "this is just my experience," but it was all about refeeding. They didn't care about why I was engaging in these behaviors. They wanted to make sure I was medically stable and then they sent me back to my parents' house with strict instructions to keep an eye on me. In many ways, treatment made it worse.

(I have one specific memory of group therapy, where we were talking about body trends throughout history [presumably to illustrate that the perfect body is a myth]. The therapist said, "How about Marilyn Monroe?" I started, "Well, she was thin, but she wasn't-" and the therapist cut me off to say, "No, she wasn't!" and explain how she was curvy and beautiful and everyone loved her. This was well-intentioned. But to me, the teenager with years of obsessive urges and crippling body dysmorphia, who legitimately was fatter than Marilyn Monroe, this became a core memory. It might seem a small thing, and in the grand scheme of things, it is. But I learned a lot about what was expected of me in treatment at that moment.)

Treatment inadvertently taught me many things. It taught me that recovery needs to be fast, because it's a drain on family members if it's too slow. It taught me that people who looked like me don't need recovery the same way as others, I needed to "eat normally" and leave. It taught me that it didn't matter what I needed, what I was getting from my behaviors, because the behaviors were bad. It taught me that my experience was somehow intrinsically different than others', because maybe I really did need to lose weight. It taught me that if I wanted to be a good person, I needed to "get better."

So when I "failed" at recovery, I felt horrible about myself. When I lapsed and relapsed and struggled to stand up on my own, I felt morally inferior, because recovery is what you do. People who don't recover d!e. Good people try harder.

I've come to realize, now, that I wouldn't use these behaviors if I didn't need them. I don't enjoy them (contrary to popular belief). I've found some alternatives that work sometimes and others that never do. I've been in therapy for years now, and every therapist says the same things about needing self-confidence and healing childhood trauma. But it doesn't matter, and it never has. I have a great relationship with myself. I think I'm wonderful, and I see my weaknesses, and I'm committed to my growth. Yeah, there's some childhood stuff, but I've been working through it for years, and I'm way healthier now than I have been historically.

And I still use these coping mechanisms. And I think I might always, to some degree. Could I "get better"? Maybe. I don't know, honestly. That's a massive amount of time and resources. It's hard work that demands your focus and energy and money. It's even harder work for people who are multiply marginalized to access services. Maybe I will pick "recovery" one day.

Right now I'm committed to harm reduction. I eat when and what I can. I take care of myself when and after I use a behavior. I'm honest with the people I trust. I don't pretend this isn't happening to me and I don't pretend that it doesn't suck. And equally, I let myself have good days. I don't invalidate myself when things are going well. I don't lie to myself.

And I'm not "crazy" for choosing this. "Recovery" as a concept is inaccessible to me right now. I'm Autistic and have yet to find a provider willing to accommodate my sensory issues. I'm a student and unable to pay for better health care. I'm just not ready to recover. (They say you'll never be ready, and I disagree, but that's another post.)

This doesn't mean I'm engaging in everything all the time and spiraling constantly. I do what I can, when I can. But people consistently act like this is not a rational decision. But it's my body. It's my life. It's not the safest way to live, and I know that. But I get to pick anyway.

I know this post is chaotic and I'm not sure if I got across what I'm trying to, but the point is, even if I wasn't picking harm reduction as the current safest, healthiest, reasonably accessible path for me, it would still be my choice. If I decided to engage until I d!ed, that is still my choice. I, and other chronically mad people, should still have autonomy. I'm still a person. I'm doing this for a reason, and calling me "crazy" or "incompetent" only serves to alienate me more from the recovery I might eventually choose.

But I deserve support even if I never, ever, "get better."

[willowshelter]

Let 👏 disabled 👏 characters 👏 be 👏 and👏 stay 👏 disabled 👏

[queerpunktomatoes]

I will say this until I am blue in the face.

Attendance policies are ableist.

And it's not like they particularly work well either, especially in higher education. The literature shows no significant difference in people going to class vs not going to class with or without an attendance policy.

Yes, it's true, people do better in school when they're in class. But disabled people know this. We're already at a disadvantage, don't punish us further.

When I say “school should be disability accessible”, I don’t just mean we need handicap rails and EAs. Kids should be able to miss a day without failing out of school. You shouldn’t be dismissed from clubs because your attendance record is “spotty” (true story). I once missed an entire week of school because of a terrible, unending migraine. I was expected to keep up with my studies despite the blinding pain that came with working on my computer. When I heard my teachers say that you couldn’t miss exams, I asked what I would have to do to be excused from them. Their response? “Either get a doctor’s note an hour before the exam or death of an immediate family member.”

I cannot express how rigid this expectation was. First of all, with my condition, I wouldn’t have enough warning about my sickness to go to the doctor and request a note. For many people, this is exceptionally difficult, especially with the current shortage of medical professionals. Next, it ignores the fact that my schedule may not line with theirs because of my medical needs. Once, I had to visit a hospital a province away (which I was on the waiting list of for over a year) on the same day as an exam. I begged my mother not to take me because I was so nervous that I would be marked as an automatic fail. I was lucky enough to make it work, but that’s only because of my spectacular support system consisting of family members and wonderful doctors.

Disabilities aren’t always about needing a bus that can accommodate wheelchairs. It’s already difficult enough for many of us to maintain school attendance without the harsh punishments involved for skipping a day. We need to be able to miss school without being punished. Only than can you claim that the school is “accessible”

[canonkiller]

but you can't keep holding on like this.

[noagskryf]

Do people not understand that even if someone was surrounded by money and food and water and clothing and shelter, if they physically cannot feed themselves or dress themselves, they would die? Because i feel like some people think that the Great Solution is eradicate poverty and not "accept that some disabled people do rely on constant care and no amount of resources can substitute the need for human help"

Obviously poverty and inequalities in society make it harder for disabled people to survive but i don't think some activists understand that disability itself is disabling and disability isn't just an outcome of ones circumstances

[androdragynous]

I know i complained about the stardew valley penny and George cutscene at length but the it really is fucking. bizarre the lengths people will go to defend it because "the game lets you pick to side with him" (please do literally any reading about wheelchair use and realize why it's a problem that the game rewards you for moving someone without their consent.) or variants of that sentiment but then it's like. the rest of the cutscene is also So Weird

Like. Penny moves an old man in a wheelchair without asking him. He gets upset, she asks if you saw what happened The game prompts you to select from;

"I was. You did a kind thing there, Penny." (+50 friendship with Penny)

"I was. You should've asked instead of assuming George wanted help." (-50 friendship with Penny)

"I'm just taking a walk, minding my own business." (No effect on friendship.)

And these are the REVISED options. Before 1.4, the second option wasn't"you should have asked", it was "You should've left him alone. Now he's grumpy."

So already it's kind of shit. The person she's upset - who's entire existence in the game is experiencing inaccessibility, let's be real - because he was shoved without permission just for being in a wheelchair doesn't have his friendship level affected at all.

Regardless of which answer you pick, George apologizes (Penny does not apologize in every choice! But the guy she shoved does!) and says she was kind.

Once he's gone, she talks about how hard it must be to be old. It's worth noting, for what it's worth, that George has been using a wheelchair since a mining accident caused his immobility; it's not a result of age, and you learn about this whole he struggles with a bookshelf in his own home, where presumably he has been living with a wheelchair for at least two decades (given how he talks about his grandson), which is a whole different can of worms because why is this never addressed in a fictional community with multiple craftspeople who frequently do projects for each other?

Anyways. So Penny's like, damn, sucks that he's old. And the options the game gives you - all neutral in terms of friendship points - are:

"I'd rather not think about it."

"It's just a different part of life."

"That's why we should respect our elders."

"I'd rather die young..."

Like are you kidding me? You have a cutscene that's about being disabled - it's not about aging, because his disability was not caused by aging, it is explicitly and directly about the fact that he is in a wheelchair. And the game assumes your opinions will be "Not my problem,", "That's an old people thing,", and "I'D RATHER BE DEAD"? And this is something people just... don't remark on? Even in conversations ABOUT this cutscene? Like, George's mentions of being disabled are already Constantly Miserable -able-bodied writer standard quality - but the game is just like. Yeah you can say you'd rather be dead rather than express any positive sentiment about this guy surviving a traumatic mining accident. You can't say it's great that he's able to still be a part of the community in his chair, or renovate his house to make it accessible the way you can build ENTIRE HOMES for other characters. The community center you rebuild in the Good Ending for the community is only accessible by stairs. The path out of his home is dirt. It's the little things, y'know, like... obviously he wasn't thought about as his own character. The game's writing sees him as a source of conflict for others, and down to the very tiles of the terrain, he's irrelevant.

AND THEN THE TOWN DOCTOR DOES A HIPAA VIOLATION AND GETS SAD IF YOU SAY GEORGE SHOULD HAVE AGENCY OVER HIS OWN BODY. WHAT ARE WE FUCKING DOING HERE

[naamahdarling]

By the way, the US Social Security portal by which you apply, update, and access records of your benefits has hours.

Blah blah blah some excuse blah it's a website relied on by millions, it should not be closed every single night. They could devise a way.

This system could not BE any more halfassed.

[scissorcraft]

so. rescuing kittens, huh.

[hakusins]

T-The devil came and and she made me do terrible things and made me feel weird and and strange and maybe horny and she made me not focus on my work and gave me funny ideas and I want to draw them so bad and she’s bad right? And I had a little dooodle but I can’t attach it so uuuuuuuu

hang in there dollya !!! you can do it, you'll survive this !! i promise !!!

[disablednotdifferent]

It’s currently 11 pm, EST. I’m sitting on a barstool in my kitchen while i make myself dinner because my legs hurt (just finished a 6 hour standing shift) and i’m lightheaded, and yknow what ? accommodating myself like this really improved my day. just thought i’d share (:

[pansyfemme]

my third ‘burst out crying for a reason i am unable to put into words’ event in two days

[flamingo--ing]

i was an alien this weekend !!! we led a parade!!

[swordsonnet]

lately, i've seen more people in the online autistic community acknowledging the struggles of people with higher support needs, which is of course an important development. but for some, that seems to come with the implicit assumption that low needs autistics "have it easy" or experience no stigma at all, which is just wrong??? people with low support needs are still disabled by their autism and still face discrimination because of it. sure, they are impaired to a lesser degree than those with higher support needs, but that doesn't mean you can just erase their struggles, y'know?

[saturnniidae]

Why. Why do people think making AUs where Hiccup keeps his leg is a good thing..

[ditzydoodiary]

"its beneficial for you to watch other things in order for you to expand your horizons" no !!! go away !!!! i exclusively watch children's/animated media because it is one of the ONLY types of media/tv shows/movies i can process as an autistic person. everything else is too stressful. im perfectly happy watching only kids media idgaf dont tell me what to do if its something that unnecessary