My truly personal blog. All the fragments of me that donβt fit on the rest of the earth, Tey/temme/tir. everything i find lovely, cute, funny or necessary goes here. this is my sanctuary, my home, my first tumblr blog. I run many others, if you want to ask about them go ahead. welcome, explore. it's all for others in the end, things just percolate here.
JRR Tolkien, 2/3rds done with return of the king: shit this is getting really gay. I know, I’ll just,
Sam, cradling Frodo, kissing his forehead: hey remember that one girl from the shire that I literally haven’t mentioned once until this moment………wonder what shes up to
If you ever tell a disabled person that they can do anything they put their mind to, you personally owe me $10,000.
When I was in primary and high school we often had PE. I would of course be the slowest and clumsiest person on the field who always got tired way before anyone else. I don’t know about anywhere else, but at my school, sport was status.
I have distinct memories of Friday afternoon non-PSSA cricket. The entire time I was fielding, I felt like I was going to pass out, I could never catch anything. When I was batting, I could hear the groans and laughs from my team because I could only rarely hit the ball, and when I did it was never far.
I can clearly remember teachers telling me I wasn’t trying hard enough. That I was lazy and unfocused.
But here’s the thing. I did focus. I put my mind to it. Every single time.
I loved the feeling of running, when it didn’t make me feel like my bones would slide out of place.
The things those teachers told me? I believed them. Of course I did, what else was I going to believe? Society has a very strict and narrow view of what constitutes a disability and I am the first person in my family to have an active EDS gene.
When my health deteriorated significantly further and I discovered I had hEDS, my view on all my memories changed.
I don’t currently have the words to describe the sheer fury I now hold towards all of these people.
Moral of the story is that telling us we can do anything we put our minds to isn’t just ignorant, its downright harmful. Even now I still feel the flush of shame when someone says I can do something I know I can’t.
Besides, the very definition of disability means there are things we can’t do. So accept these differences and accommodate for them, don’t just pretend that our disabilities don’t exist because they make you uncomfortable. That’s your problem.
