Early in my disability I had a rejecting attitude towards other disabled and have only just got rid of this. I didn’t want to mix with disabled people, didn’t want to be associated with them. I wanted to pass for non-disabled . . . I wanted desperately to be accepted as “normal.”
– Elsa, paralyzed
I always had a fear that I was going to be rejected because I couldn’t look a person in the eyes (I focus off to the side). How would a person feel if I told them I loved them and I was looking past them?
– Barbara, visual impairment
The first time I played on the varsity basketball team, I tried to hide my burns by wearing tight pantyhose to cover up my legs. But the coach wouldn’t let me play until I took them off. He sent me to the restroom. I cried in there, not wanting to show my burns and be stared at. I was called on to hurry out and get on the court with my team and in seconds the game began. That was the beginning ofmy self-confidence.
– Lois, deaf
Wheelchair sports have been very important to me. I get an almost orgasmic feeling from excelling, winning … being able to control my body and do sports well … I would be the last person to go out on the beach in a bikini, but I see myself as being attractive.
– Roseanne, post polio quad
Being profoundly deaf hasn’t broken my heart. I just changed my way of living. You can always find a way to substitute for what is lost.
– Joanne, deaf
Once I learned that American Sign Language is my language, I developed a strong sense ofidentity as a deafperson and a more positive self-image.
– Barbara, deaf
My first period was truly welcome…. At last my body had done something right … something every female body is supposed to do.
– Anonymous, scoliosis
After my injury I didn’t care what I looked like. I met visitors in my robe with a cap pulled over my head. One day I said, “I don’t care what I look like.” Immediately I thought, “How ugly that sounds.” I started taking care of myself and I realized that my appearance affected how people treated me. It made me feel good that people appreciated how I looked. I started taking the time with clothes and make-up that was natural to me before the accident. It worked.
– Re’gena, spinal cord injury
I have diabetes, I think one o f the things that is the hardest about it for me is that I don’t look sick so the type of invalidation I get “Wow, I never would have guessed it. You look so healthy!” I don’t need to hear that. I’d like to talk about some of the things that get me down.
– H.S. Senior, diabetes
Just last year, after getting together with various kinds of disabled women from all over the country, I compared my disabilities with theirs. I listened to their problems, what they’ve gone through and what they were and are confronted with. I realized that I was no worse off than most of them. From these days I cried and awoke to see who I really was. I talked with my close friends, asking them to be honest and tell me what they thought about me as a person. I got very little negative response, so I grew to like and love myself even more. Today I know who I am, if I am loved, wanted and cared for. But most of all I love myself for what I am now.
– Lois, deaf
Being black, I’ve found that I can’t always get what I need…. I became disabled and pregnant in the same year. My whole life was turned around. I had already left home and now I was back living with my mother. I was told to settle for just staying at home but I couldn’t accept that and I didn’t.
– Jackie, chronic lung infection
Who am I to give advice? I don’t have any secret … Unless it’s to be yourself. When you look in the mirror, you are you, and there’s nothing you can do about it. And I’d rather be happy about it and laugh, than cry and have tears.
– Jill, amputee
I have really had to work to keep up with my sighted peers. I have had successes as well as failures. I think that people with disabilities often strive so hard to compete with non-disabled peers that they forget that it’s ok to gauge small successes. Both disabled as well as non-disabled people have the right to have successes as well as failures.
– Lori, partially sighted
Some deaf children look down on sign language. They do not want to sign in public because people will say that they are “DEAFAND DUMB.” They get that attitude from their parents or teachers.
– Mary Beth, hearing impaired
In the past couple of years I have become aware ofmy body and have decided it’s not distasteful. Before I had concentrated on developing and using my mind. My body I’d just cover up so I looked ok. Now I’ve decided my body is fine: it’s just different from other people’s. Now I adore my body, dress up. I swim and take karate which centers just on me and my body.
– Margaret, post-polio
Once when I was staying in the hospital, my sister and I got in wheelchairs and started racing through the halls. I really liked it. I had never moved that fast before. Then in junior high school I started playing wheelchair sports. Sports have helped me to gain confidence in myself. Confidence was something I had lost a long time before.
– Debbie, cerebral palsy
I had this image of myself as a big blob, no shape just dead meat.
– Barbara, arthrogryposis
I was born without legs and with a right arm that ends where most people have an elbow. It’s an unusual body, but it is a body. It houses a living person and lets me do many of the things I want to do to fulfill my life.
– Sara, amputee