Redefining 'disability'
Having such amazing qualities, along with others, I've been wondering why a disability is even called a disability. Even though I have a 'disability', it barely affects me in any bad way (in terms of how it affects me, external problems are a completely different story), and I can say the same about others. My cousin for example, doesn't care about what anyone thinks about him whenever he's the only 13 year old in a supermarket playing with action figures or dolls still, he is a very strong individual, and he never gives up on anything he puts his mind into. I've seen amazing stories from so many people with 'disabilities', and from my point of view, being called 'disabled' affects us more than the condition itself. I've had more problems about family, friends, and other things than struggles from my disability itself, which is something that was supposed to give me a huge challenge throughout my life. I now see that that's not the case for me, and for many other people, but the meaning of a disability is still unchanged. What that means is that others who don't go beyond the fundamentals of what a disability really is, will continue to see people like me as inferior, despite our strengths, I know this from experience. So how do I alter the meaning of 'disability'? In today's blog, I want to explain why I see the word disability as a 'different ability', and why others should as well.
I want to sort of move this topic outside of the autism spectrum, since there's so many stories of people that show how much we matter as individuals like anyone else. We are simply different, we are not inferior, less, etc. and we shouldn't be treated badly, discriminated, etc. just for being different, cause there's nothing wrong with being different. I want to also move this blog outside of my (too) personal life, as I have had other stories in the past I don't really talk about. An example of this comes from after school one day about a few months ago. Me and my sister were on the bus, and I was in back of her (she couldn't sit next to me since I had a huge project on me that I didn't want getting destroyed). A few stops after we entered the bus, a guy enters the bus, and he sits down next to my sister. Even though my massive project was in front of my face, I still got a good peek at the guy, and I realized that he was 'disabled'. How did I know this so quickly, well in the Los Angeles county (pretty sure it's based on the county, but if I'm wrong, it's for sure based on the state of California), there's a program called ACCESS. I'm not too strong in the details, but basically qualifying individuals can receive a card that allows them to have unlimited free bus trips on the metro bus lines (not sure if it's restricted to this company), and the only people who are eligible for this card are people with 'disabilities'. Getting off topic for a bit, I was actually going to get a ACCESS card at one point, as my mom was stressing me to get one, but I kept refusing to get one as I didn't want others to know (it was the time before the whole 8th grade incident, which was the time when I really hated being disabled), so she eventually gave up. Back to the story, he began talking to my sister, saying how are you and how was your day. Already I heard it in my sister's tone that she had no interest in talking with this stranger, and she began to get irritated around the end of our trip, but the guy didn't notice. He eventually said something that didn't necessarily caught my attention, but it made me feel lots of empathy for him. He said out of nowhere "I get really lonely sometimes, I don't have any friends." It made me feel sad that people didn't really accept him and he was forced to live the consequences. He went as far as giving my sister his phone number on a piece of paper to show that he wasn't kidding. Once we got out of the bus, and he proceed on it, my sister said "that weirdo gave me his phone number, like I'm really going to call him." She threw it in a trash can and we proceed to our house. I would've definitely gave him a call if I was the person he came up to, because I understand the feeling of being alone because you're considered different from society, as if that was a bad thing. This guy just wanted to desperately get a friend who can be with him through all the tough times and know his true personality, yet he was instead brought down due to the community seeing a disability as a bad thing. His way of making friends was his different ability.
There was a girl in my class in the 7th grade, who was on the spectrum. I knew that since whenever my RSP teacher would leave his files out in the open on this laptop, the names of the students showed up and of course, everyone on the list (me included) had autism. Anyways, we all had to do a speech for our science class based on positive and negative charges of electrons. I presented mine fairly well, and a few people later it was her turn to present. She had a few incidents before, in which in the first speech she literally walked out of the classroom cause she was too nervous, another time she couldn't stand up because she forgot her lines, and whenever she did manage to get up, she would take forever to say a few lines from how frightened she was. So, (as obvious as it seems), her 'disability' mainly affected her socially, in which she was the shyest person I've ever meet. If I thought I had trust issues, she took things to a whole new level. Nonetheless, in this presentation, she did what others thought were impossible. I knew she had it in her, to present her speech and give it her all, but all it needed was a little effort, and that's exactly what she did this time. The day she went up, she was folding flash cards with her, which were prohibited as we were supposed to remember our speech, but of course the teacher had to make an expectation. She did the possible in my eyes, impossible for the others, she gave the best speech on the topic out of everyone, and that's saying something after she was one of the last people getting up, due to her last name. She had more information than me, and she had way more examples and even real-life examples. Of course we applauded her in the end and of course she got the highest grade for that speech. We had two more speeches after that one, so for her it was only the beginning. The first one was no different, which wasn't a bad thing since she still strived to achieve something huge, but the final one took things even further. The teacher was grading us hard on the final speech, and I barely managed to snag a B+ after long days of research (still got an A as an overall grade), but her along with another guy were the only ones who got A's on the final speech. For one, she didn't have any flash cards on her when she went up, and she didn't show any signs of fear at all. She properly addressed all of the information that was required from her, and went above that. In the end, she went from her problems getting the best of her, to her conquering her problems. I knew she had it in her all along, I knew she was able to give the best speech from everyone. I didn't realize this before, but now I realize that she did things differently, and it proved to be a good thing for her. Her courage to let go of her fears and try her best at anything is her different ability.
There are people who are meant to be different, in order to make their world and everyone's else world a better place. Of course I have to bring up my cousin up in this topic, because despite being seriously mentally challenged by the views of others, I have seen him as someone who can overcome many obstacles and keeping shooting forward. When he feel in love with the lalaloopsy dolls, even though after three years of him loving the dolls, society caught up to him, he still didn't care that people would stare at him in stores, train stations, you name it. When year two of his obsession came by, I told him at one point "hey, have you noticed that people have been staring at you whenever you take your dolls out in public?" He responded "well I love my dolls, and they're not going anywhere." (I mean he sort of got that from me, but you get the idea). He didn't listen to me after one of the very few people he trusts told him that people were judging him, and I didn't expect him to listen at all. Last summer, I went over to his house and when I went to his bedroom, he wasn't there. I asked his mom where he was and she said he was at the pool (yes they have a actual pool in their backyard, that's why I love going over during summer). When I went to his backyard, I saw him swimming all around the pool. I asked him "can I join?" He answered "not now, I have to practice swimming, I have a competition for swim class next week and I have to learn the moves." (He had a certain move that I remember he struggled on, but I forgot which one it was). It was Thursday and he was sort of starting to get it, but he still didn't know it. I didn't hang out with him that whole week since everyday that week, all he did was practice swimming. I told him that afternoon, "we hadn't hanged out this whole week, you've just been swimming." He answered "I have to get the move right, tomorrow's the big day and I just have to get it right." At that point, I knew he had the courage to get the move right and despite him not getting it right as well as me telling him stuff, he still continued to try his best. Friday came, and even though I didn't see him, he figured out the move Thursday evening and used it to pass his test on Friday. He passed level 4 of swimming class and will take on level 5 this summer as a result of his hard work. To this day, he has shown to me that he will not allow society to make him someone that he doesn't want to be. Some speech delays, academic delays, whatever he has, is no match for the amount of strength he has within him every single day. That's his kind of different ability, and it shows that it truly outshines his other problems.
I hope everyone enjoyed this week's blog, I've been very busy this past week so the fact that I've been able to find some spare time to write my blog has me so relieved. I hope you were able to see with these stories that having a disability doesn't mean that your abilities are worst than others, rather it means that you are different and people will know that, but it shouldn't mean that we should be made fun of for being different. If you enjoyed my blog, why not comment down any comment that you might have and I'll read it right away. Also, by hitting the follow button, you'll gain access to my blogs before anyone else does. I hope everyone has a great day :)
I want to sort of move this topic outside of the autism spectrum, since there's so many stories of people that show how much we matter as individuals like anyone else. We are simply different, we are not inferior, less, etc. and we shouldn't be treated badly, discriminated, etc. just for being different, cause there's nothing wrong with being different. I want to also move this blog outside of my (too) personal life, as I have had other stories in the past I don't really talk about. An example of this comes from after school one day about a few months ago. Me and my sister were on the bus, and I was in back of her (she couldn't sit next to me since I had a huge project on me that I didn't want getting destroyed). A few stops after we entered the bus, a guy enters the bus, and he sits down next to my sister. Even though my massive project was in front of my face, I still got a good peek at the guy, and I realized that he was 'disabled'. How did I know this so quickly, well in the Los Angeles county (pretty sure it's based on the county, but if I'm wrong, it's for sure based on the state of California), there's a program called ACCESS. I'm not too strong in the details, but basically qualifying individuals can receive a card that allows them to have unlimited free bus trips on the metro bus lines (not sure if it's restricted to this company), and the only people who are eligible for this card are people with 'disabilities'. Getting off topic for a bit, I was actually going to get a ACCESS card at one point, as my mom was stressing me to get one, but I kept refusing to get one as I didn't want others to know (it was the time before the whole 8th grade incident, which was the time when I really hated being disabled), so she eventually gave up. Back to the story, he began talking to my sister, saying how are you and how was your day. Already I heard it in my sister's tone that she had no interest in talking with this stranger, and she began to get irritated around the end of our trip, but the guy didn't notice. He eventually said something that didn't necessarily caught my attention, but it made me feel lots of empathy for him. He said out of nowhere "I get really lonely sometimes, I don't have any friends." It made me feel sad that people didn't really accept him and he was forced to live the consequences. He went as far as giving my sister his phone number on a piece of paper to show that he wasn't kidding. Once we got out of the bus, and he proceed on it, my sister said "that weirdo gave me his phone number, like I'm really going to call him." She threw it in a trash can and we proceed to our house. I would've definitely gave him a call if I was the person he came up to, because I understand the feeling of being alone because you're considered different from society, as if that was a bad thing. This guy just wanted to desperately get a friend who can be with him through all the tough times and know his true personality, yet he was instead brought down due to the community seeing a disability as a bad thing. His way of making friends was his different ability.
There was a girl in my class in the 7th grade, who was on the spectrum. I knew that since whenever my RSP teacher would leave his files out in the open on this laptop, the names of the students showed up and of course, everyone on the list (me included) had autism. Anyways, we all had to do a speech for our science class based on positive and negative charges of electrons. I presented mine fairly well, and a few people later it was her turn to present. She had a few incidents before, in which in the first speech she literally walked out of the classroom cause she was too nervous, another time she couldn't stand up because she forgot her lines, and whenever she did manage to get up, she would take forever to say a few lines from how frightened she was. So, (as obvious as it seems), her 'disability' mainly affected her socially, in which she was the shyest person I've ever meet. If I thought I had trust issues, she took things to a whole new level. Nonetheless, in this presentation, she did what others thought were impossible. I knew she had it in her, to present her speech and give it her all, but all it needed was a little effort, and that's exactly what she did this time. The day she went up, she was folding flash cards with her, which were prohibited as we were supposed to remember our speech, but of course the teacher had to make an expectation. She did the possible in my eyes, impossible for the others, she gave the best speech on the topic out of everyone, and that's saying something after she was one of the last people getting up, due to her last name. She had more information than me, and she had way more examples and even real-life examples. Of course we applauded her in the end and of course she got the highest grade for that speech. We had two more speeches after that one, so for her it was only the beginning. The first one was no different, which wasn't a bad thing since she still strived to achieve something huge, but the final one took things even further. The teacher was grading us hard on the final speech, and I barely managed to snag a B+ after long days of research (still got an A as an overall grade), but her along with another guy were the only ones who got A's on the final speech. For one, she didn't have any flash cards on her when she went up, and she didn't show any signs of fear at all. She properly addressed all of the information that was required from her, and went above that. In the end, she went from her problems getting the best of her, to her conquering her problems. I knew she had it in her all along, I knew she was able to give the best speech from everyone. I didn't realize this before, but now I realize that she did things differently, and it proved to be a good thing for her. Her courage to let go of her fears and try her best at anything is her different ability.
There are people who are meant to be different, in order to make their world and everyone's else world a better place. Of course I have to bring up my cousin up in this topic, because despite being seriously mentally challenged by the views of others, I have seen him as someone who can overcome many obstacles and keeping shooting forward. When he feel in love with the lalaloopsy dolls, even though after three years of him loving the dolls, society caught up to him, he still didn't care that people would stare at him in stores, train stations, you name it. When year two of his obsession came by, I told him at one point "hey, have you noticed that people have been staring at you whenever you take your dolls out in public?" He responded "well I love my dolls, and they're not going anywhere." (I mean he sort of got that from me, but you get the idea). He didn't listen to me after one of the very few people he trusts told him that people were judging him, and I didn't expect him to listen at all. Last summer, I went over to his house and when I went to his bedroom, he wasn't there. I asked his mom where he was and she said he was at the pool (yes they have a actual pool in their backyard, that's why I love going over during summer). When I went to his backyard, I saw him swimming all around the pool. I asked him "can I join?" He answered "not now, I have to practice swimming, I have a competition for swim class next week and I have to learn the moves." (He had a certain move that I remember he struggled on, but I forgot which one it was). It was Thursday and he was sort of starting to get it, but he still didn't know it. I didn't hang out with him that whole week since everyday that week, all he did was practice swimming. I told him that afternoon, "we hadn't hanged out this whole week, you've just been swimming." He answered "I have to get the move right, tomorrow's the big day and I just have to get it right." At that point, I knew he had the courage to get the move right and despite him not getting it right as well as me telling him stuff, he still continued to try his best. Friday came, and even though I didn't see him, he figured out the move Thursday evening and used it to pass his test on Friday. He passed level 4 of swimming class and will take on level 5 this summer as a result of his hard work. To this day, he has shown to me that he will not allow society to make him someone that he doesn't want to be. Some speech delays, academic delays, whatever he has, is no match for the amount of strength he has within him every single day. That's his kind of different ability, and it shows that it truly outshines his other problems.
I hope everyone enjoyed this week's blog, I've been very busy this past week so the fact that I've been able to find some spare time to write my blog has me so relieved. I hope you were able to see with these stories that having a disability doesn't mean that your abilities are worst than others, rather it means that you are different and people will know that, but it shouldn't mean that we should be made fun of for being different. If you enjoyed my blog, why not comment down any comment that you might have and I'll read it right away. Also, by hitting the follow button, you'll gain access to my blogs before anyone else does. I hope everyone has a great day :)
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