A lot happened since I last sat down to write anything.
The idea had been to start doing news pieces still around disability and mental
health issues but more generic and fun then so dark and gloomy and not always
from my point of few. Unfortunately, that has not happened.
When I first started this blog it was to chart my progress
on the run up to my amputations, the recovery and what happened next. It then
grew into something more for me than just an online diary that people may or
may not be interested in reading. It became a voice, a way to tell people and
show people exactly how difficult life could be when you are disabled, but also
to show others in similar situations that there is hope and to inspire people
to get out there and start living their lives the best way that they can.
Now instead of finding fun light-hearted things to inspire
me to write about, life keeps throwing me curve balls, so all I write about is
the injustice, discrimination and exclusion people with disabilities deal with
on a day to day biases.
I thought growing up in the ’70s, before things such as the
equality act came into being, that the future for anyone with any kind of
disability would be brighter. But let’s face it here we are in the 21st
century and hate crimes or on the rise (just the fact they had to introduce a
new law to cover these things says everything), and society is far from accessible
or understanding at all, if anything I would say it’s less accessible in some
ways, far less understanding and tolerant (and not just about disabilities) and
less accepting.
Recently my son who has ASD and Tibia Torshin and my
daughter were attacked on their way home from school, simply because he is
autistic. Due to not being able to get a rise from my son who was trying his
best to get home, they pushed his sister’s buttons, knowing that this would
upset my son, trying to encourage her to fight. When my daughter refused they
knew the way to get my daughter to lose her temper was to “trigger” my son,
which they did. They did this by taking his bag, taking his pens and pencils
out of his top pocket and knocking and throwing around his papers. This got
them the reaction they wanted and he lashed out, hitting one of the kids who
were in the midst of it setting off his triggers, name calling him, hurling
abuse and mimicking his walking and talking. My daughter and son ended up
getting kicked to the ground and repeatedly kicked in the sides, back, legs and
in my sons head.
No one has been brought to justice over this, despite
threats being made the week before about my daughter getting jumped through
prank phone calls, despite ongoing talks with the school due to kids and
teachers attitudes and bullying and despite reporting attacks that have
happened previously to my daughters because their brother is autistic to the
police. The children involved closed ranks, their families closed ranks and
other people who saw what happened were too scared to say anything to the
police for fear of reprisals. I even got accused of playing the victim,
apparently having nothing better to do and my children accused of being trouble
makers.
Welcome to a snapshot of equality and inclusion for anyone
with a disability in the 21st century.
There are still so many businesses out there that do not
understand what inclusion for people who have disabilities actually means. “But
they make all toilets accessible now to everyone as not all disabilities are visible!
“I hear you shout, and your right, but we still have people having to change
their teenage child or adult on a dirty bathroom floor for the sake of extra
space to put a full changing space in. “But public transport has disabled
spaces!” another thing you shout at me and yes they do….but you see people won’t
move out of the space if someone in a wheelchair needs to get on that bus.
There has been plenty of stories in the press lately about people in
wheelchairs being stranded by bus drivers, having abuse hurled at them by the
other passengers for holding the bus up or even having to let 2 or 3 buses go
past before they could get on one with the wheelchair space free. Now am not
saying people with buggies should stop using buses, but it is my understanding
(I refuse to use buses due to these exact reasons and how much anxiety it
actually causes me, I would rather just not go out!), that there is one side
for prams and one side for wheelchairs, if that is so then why is it not enforced
if someone using a wheelchair needs to get on the bus? When I was younger
(fair enough buses back then were not disabled accessible at all !!), but
anyone who had a pram had to put it down and store it, just like you would if
you were using a car and putting it in the boot. Half the time people are
leaving the prams up and then the child is getting out and walking to a seat
anyway, so wouldn’t it just make more sense to fold and store? I know the struggle of trying to manage a small child, a baby and bags of shopping whilst
trying to fold and unfold a pram, but you did it, you managed, you had too.
I still get confronted every day by discrimination in
various forms, even sometimes from friends and extended family (not all of them
unintentional either, but that’s another blog post), and it can be
disheartening, to say the least, and sometimes if your mood is not good it can
lead to depressing thoughts that make you wonder why you bother and why you
keep trying to be part of society let alone a productive one.
So what happened to the bright shiny future we were all
promised? , the 21st century being all inclusive for everyone,
everyone would be equal, no more segregation, no more discrimination?
In my opinion, for what it’s worth ( and after all it is my
blog), sometimes there are days I stop and look around and honestly think it is worse now with exclusion and inequality towards disabilities then we ever
were when I was a child.
Now there’s food for thought.
