Why me? I ask myself this question everyday why was I born so sick? Why was a born with these mental and physical struggles? Why do I feel so different like I don’t belong here? Why did I not die a birth? Why did I live instead?
These are things that I ask myself when my depression/ anxiety speak for themselves. I fight them back every day each day goes by it get a bit easier since starting therapy and getting medicine. Even so it still a fight, I for so long was afraid to seek help due to being suicidal I was afraid they would lock me away and throw away the key, like they do to so many others. I had personal connection to this fear my mom had an aunt who was sent away to the mental hospital back in the late 60s, to this day no one has any idea what happen to her once she was sent away no one heard from her or saw her again. This is something that is not just history it still happens to people today, but no one know or speaks about it. This why many people fear asking for help they don’t want to be taken away thrown in a hospital and have all their basic human rights stripped from them.
Solitary confinement is a cruel/inhumane punishment they put not just prisoners through but also those with mental struggles. They say to protect them, but it is to control them this does not help a prisoner reform nor help someone with mental health recover it only make these issues worse. Although has been some improvement but nowhere enough and it only improved for those of certain class and race.
ng disabled in any contact in a non disability friendly society is hard. I would be classified as having a disability that is not visual. I have learning issues and was born with medical issues to the point of needing a liver transplant at the age of 2 and needing my spleen removed in 11th grade in 2013. This is not visible but due to these health issues I have always been behind my grade level. As for many if not all people who have any type of disability, people tend to give you “pity” or praise for doing the simplistic things. Although most times it is people trying to be nice it is dehumanizing and hurts/irritates me and many others. The documentary we watched is nice being able to have somewhere to go where you can be yourself since when you are disabled you are often not allowed to have the same things or experiences the same thing as a “normal” person. As for myself not having a visible disability I was not shield from these opportunities but at same time this is complicated because it was not as noticeable I was not offered the help I needed when I was young would never really get much help until I was in my late 20s when I had advocated for myself it even still I feel I am not completely diagnosed therefore do not get all the help I need but i have unfortunately accepted I will never be able to truly know what it like not to struggle so much intellectually, mentally or physically.
Even with my accepts of my situation I think it is important to unite together to change things for the better for the next generation, like how they did in the video the civil right activist and black panthers helped those in the disability rights movement because they both had a goal in common of wanting to be treated equal and treated like human bringing and not monsters who are less then.
A few weeks ago I had a difficult bipolar/autistic meltdown that spiraled me into a dissociative state. I say bipolar slash autistic because the criteria and symptoms for both disorders overlap so much that it is nearly impossible to tell them apart within my own body at this point. I wasn’t able to attend some of my classes for two weeks because my mental state was feeling immensely guilty about using my accommodations. Every time I typed up another email to a professor, saying that I once again had to rely on my disability accommodations, I felt my chest tighten with anxiety and guilt, as if I was doing something wrong by needing my accommodations. I didn’t want my professors to think that I was lying to get out of class to go out with my friends. To be fair I did hang out with my friends and try and do stuff during the time I had class, but everything we did was an attempt to pull me out of the dissociative state I was in. As someone who has heard numerous times that they don’t look “autistic” or “disabled”, I am aware that this is a judgment that many pass on me, and I was aware that my professors may think that as well. Perhaps out of guilt, I sent an email to my professors, explaining that I had bipolar disorder and was struggling to pull myself out of a rough episode that left me unable to even read and comprehend the readings for any of my classes. Most of my professors answered with supportive statements, validating my disability and granting me as many extensions as I needed. One professor emailed me back, ignoring the fact that I had just opened up to him about my identity, and demanded I turn in my work within 48 hours, because the accommodation guidelines offered a 48 hour extension as an example guideline. Evidently, I was not able to get my work in, because I am not able to pull myself out of a dissociative episode on command; to make it worse, when I finally returned to class the following week he spoke negatively about bipolar disorder in class, leaving me stunned and panicked. I made the rather obvious assumption that I wasn’t his favorite student. Rather than fighting with him every step of the way, I decided to withdraw from the class, postponing my graduation from this December to May. I was devastated telling my parents that I would not be graduating as soon as they thought, and I was even embarrassed, knowing that if I pushed myself I could have made it through the class. But just because you can do something as a disabled person, doesn’t mean it is worth it. I was reminded in a somewhat blunt manner that not everyone will accommodate your disability, and sometimes it’s better to give up, then to fight for your right to take a class.
The emotional labour it would have taken for me to fight with this professor every step of the way, just to most likely pass with a C in his class was not worth it for me. Personally, I am proud of myself for knowing my boundaries and how far I can push myself. He made me feel weak and made me hyperaware of how people view me as someone who is bipolar and on the sepctrum.
Subtle ableism is so present in today’s world that it goes unnoticed by most, unless we are directly affected by it. For me, this was an example of direct ableism, someone who would do the bare minimum to accommodate my needs, and refused to do anything more. It was dehumanizing, but it also reminded me how lucky I am to not be faced with people like him, and ableist challenges on a daily basis. Our world was not made for disabled bodies, whether it’s expectations at work, to campuses being not accessible, to the general population applying certain stigmas to disabled people as a whole. As a physically abled person who is usually able to mask their disability in public, I don’t have to constantly worry how I will make it to class on time, or if the elevator will work today, or if I will be able to make it up the hill to my building for class, and that gives me a certain privilege. The dialectic of both being disabled and abled is an interesting limbo to live in. I can’t imagine how it would be if I had to worry about physical disability on top of my ever present mental disability, still, I can’t help but wonder if I would have been treated better by that professor if my disability had been more visible.
The following is a series of excerpts for an article that I wrote for The Retriever that was published on Wednesday. (Below is from my original draft, some changes have been made in the final version for newspaper formatting.) If these tidbits interest you, you can find the whole article in print on campus now!
UMBC, I have a challenge for you.
Administration, Student Disability Services, and Facilities all tout the campus accessible routes map as the end-all, be-all solution for disabled students navigating campus. My challenge for you is this:
Make your way to the stadium lot, and then walk to the Fine Arts Building using only routes labeled as accessible. You are not allowed to use stairs, though you may use the short cuts available through buildings via elevators. (The elevator short cuts are labeled on the map below.) For extra credit, start at the top of the hill near the Walker Apartments and go to the library.
While you are walking, focus in on your body. Ask yourself: What would this walk be like if my calves were screaming in pain? What if I struggled with balance and were prone to tripping on uneven surfaces and could fall? What if I were using a walker right now? What about a non-motorized wheelchair?
What about crutches, or a lower-limb cast? When you arrive at your destination, take a note of the time. How long did it take you compared to using the stairs? Did you have to use a new route compared to your ordinary routine?
It was disclosed to me by several students that after they met all of the (stringent and privilege-laden) requirements to receive an accommodation appointment with SDS, they are told they will be unable to get the accommodations they need. In addition, it has also been reported to me that these meetings are often negative in nature with the student seeking accommodations being met with derision and/or hostility for their accommodation requests. One student, who wishes to remain anonymous, reported being “refused note-taking assistance because they needed to ‘learn how to take notes themselves,’” as well as being refused alternative text formatting as that is up to the teacher and “they cannot do anything about it.” The student accurately pointed out that both of these accommodations are among the published list on the SDS website. Another anonymous student trying to receive accommodations was told, “I know migraines can hurt sometimes but that doesn’t mean you can miss class.”
Many of the interactions that were shared with me have a common thread that is heard all too often by the disabled community: “You’re just not trying hard enough” or “It can’t be that bad”. The implications that we are lazy, that we haven’t developed strategies to succeed in our classes, or that we are somehow exaggerating our health problems are not only outdated ways of thinking about disability but are also extremely harmful. The reality of our lives is that it frequently is “that bad,” and that we wouldn’t be asking UMBC for help if we hadn’t already exhausted all of the resources available to us as individuals. To hear these words from the people put in place to help us succeed is equivalent to lifting us up only to kick us back down. UMBC is not the only institution in Maryland struggling with this problem, as this article (https://www.jhunewsletter.com/article/2021/08/disability-isnt-taken-seriously-at-hopkins) written by a graduate student at Johns Hopkins details out. Laurel Maury was awarded accommodations by JHU but found that her professors refused to use them (even under threat of legal action) and some went as far as to bully her for having them. Maury’s struggle echoes many of the sentiments that have been expressed to me by current UMBC students.
To my fellow disabled students: You are not alone, you have a voice, and your voice deserves to be heard.
First, let me just say that TikTok is a great platform for people to speak out on what seems like small moments in their lives but are ultimately extremely impactful: few other platforms expect you to produce 60-second vignettes of information with little further context, but TikTok allows and almost requires the person behind the camera to get to the point very quickly.
To summarize the video that does not have captions (not all creators in all countries have access to that feature yet): This person is deaf and was raised in a hearing community. They started a new job, and were surprised and overwhelmed when they walked in on their first day and everyone in the office was wearing clear, see-through masks, meaning they would be able to lip read. Their first reaction was to feel gratitude for what felt like a gesture of kindness and welcome, and that they feel seen as a person.
I want to take what this person almost said and bring it a step further. This creator felt gratitude, felt welcomed, and felt seen, and they felt these things because their workplace had done what could be argued they are legally required to do in order for them to be functional in their job. While clear masks may not be spelled out as an accommodation in the ADA, it definitely became necessary during COVID-19 for the deaf community in order for them to be safe, but also to participate in society. Providing clear masks to what is presumably an office would not be considered undue hardship as it would be only slightly more expensive than providing ordinary masks to the workforce. An office with a mask mandate is most likely providing their employees with masks, so an office with a mask mandate and a deaf employee would then be legally required to provide clear masks to their workforce.
I will reiterate: This person felt gratitude because their employer did what they were legally required to do to accommodate their disability and did it promptly so the accommodation was in place when they started their first day of work.
As a member of the disabled community this tells me that the bar is on the ground. It may even be buried, and we are then overwhelmingly grateful when someone unburies the bar and hands it to us. It may still be covered in dirt and we may have a new worm friend but it’s been so long since some of us have seen the bar that we accept it as-is.
Can we even conceptualize what it would look like if every disabled person was given their accommodations on their first day of work? What would it look like if in an interview we could just hand a list to our potential employer and it wasn’t a factor in the hiring decision but simply part of their resume? What if everyone was required to submit a list of accommodations and workplace preferences as a part of their application, and it was simply accepted as standard and a best practice in hiring? What if these were accepted as necessary and automatic requirements as long as they fell under ADA guidelines and did not cause undue hardship to the employer, and thus every employer automatically provided them?
Let’s take this thought experiment one step further. What comes next? What does disability acceptance look like in a world where each individual’s needs were met to the furthest extent possible?
This may take some creative thinking on our part, but I think it’s possible to imagine. I personally can imagine an office where wheelchairs were equally as common as chairs. I can imagine that one person may be at a treadmill desk (there’s always at least one fitness enthusiast in an office) and another desk may be empty most of the time, as its owner largely worked from home. I can imagine that transcription of recorded virtual meetings would be as automatic as meeting notes, and that it would be an expectation that the office would rotate through who took on that job just like we do note-takers. I can imagine that this office would throw out traditional concepts of what a work day would look like, and what work production would look like, and that each individual would be allowed to work and produce work in a way that best suited their personality, lifestyle, neurodivergences and sleep schedules.
These ideas, though, still linger within the realm of accommodation. Is it possible to get even more outlandish in our conceptualization of disability in the workplace?
I can imagine a workplace where a disabled person has been promoted several times. I can imagine a workplace where when someone schedules a happy hour, they take into consideration locations that would be functional and welcoming for every member of the team, which may mean having drinks at a quiet restaurant instead of a loud, difficult-to-navigate bar. I can imagine that at the desk of the person who works from home, there is a prank hidden in the drawer for that person to find from a coworker who is thinking of them whether they’re physically there or not, and doesn’t care how long it takes them to find it. (Who doesn’t enjoy the long game?) I can imagine a scenario where every team member is appreciated for their social contributions to the team, and that for some people that may mean not eating lunch in the cafeteria, but may look like them tracking everyone’s birthdays and sending out celebratory emails to everyone. I can imagine that people with disabilities are treated like people and are accepted in all contexts of the word and are welcomed not only on the surface of being able to do their work adequately, but are welcomed as a human being joining a collective enterprise.
When the bar for disability accommodation is buried underground, acceptance and equity for disability is buried along with it.
A view from my bed [ID: Hazy photograph of a window illuminated by vibrant red and purple lighting. In the center there is an electric candelabra sitting on the window sill, slightly obscured by sheer curtains.]
2011 was the year I began distancing. By which I mean, I began a life lived from my twin bed, fueled by goldfish crackers and electrolyte drinks, seldom able to access the outside world. It wasn’t mine to call home anymore.
I was drowning in conditions that these doctors hardly knew about. I had no choice but to become my own doctor, nurse, and historian. More than anything, I became my own community.
The outside world was stolen from me by sickness, uncertainty, and administrative violence – this world was never built for my survival. Such predicaments were met with constant calls to push through – go into the world anyways, risk it all for a “normal” life. They said adapting to it would make me better. It wrecked my body and my mind. Being bedridden was extraordinarily taxing and painful in a way that cannot be understood by those who have not been fully immersed in it in this way, yet. But I am inseparable from my bedroom life, I am made of soft pillows and the world I built among them.
I am an able-bodied person. I take advantage of this fact every day of my life as I walk around campus. At times I get winded or my legs hurt, but for the most part, I have no trouble walking to my classes, the dining hall, or common spaces on campus. As such, it is not immediately obvious to me and other able-bodied people around me how inaccessible this campus is. Every single one of my daily routes involves stairs. I hate them, but I can climb them. This is not the case for everyone on campus.
Unruly Bodies 