Showing posts with label gratitude. Show all posts

Is it Easy for You?

By | Published Thursday, December 13, 2012

A few months ago someone emailed me about the blog, asking me about how I got started and where the ideas from posts come from. She wasn't someone with O.I. and doesn't have a child or even a friend with O.I. - she was just another blogger who was interested in the general blogging process. She said that I make it look easy, that somehow the number of posts I've made and the content that I cover seems vast and never ending. "Is it easy for you?" She'd asked.

No, it's not easy for me. Actually most of the time blogging is either really uncomfortable or really embarrassing for me. While I've been doing this since the spring of 2011 there are many days when I approach a blog post with thoughts of "oy I have to get all touchy-feely again?" Though I have gotten more comfortable with myself, blogging is not "easy" for me per se.

 For those of you who have met me in person I tend to be a little more reserved, especially about my personal thoughts and feelings. Being the only one in my family with O.I. and not having met anyone else with O.I. until my second decade, there was no space for me to dump O.I.-related thoughts into except for inside my own head. So while some of you may think that these experiences are not unique to myself alone... for most of my life they were not only personal but they were solitary and private.
I have a close group of friends - they're the ones who I will drop my world of color-coordinated schedules to see. Often those are the same friends who chuckle at the idea of me having such a widely-read and public blog "Really Sandy? You have a blog? It took me only 100 questions to find out who you're dating, what's going on in your life, and the three projects you're working on." (I promise that my friends are really all wonderful and amazing people!) It has been said that there are people who are private, and then there is Sandy.

 Being a private person I would much rather talk about things that don't have to do with me - things that are so far away from me that they're across several oceans, time zones, and things that I know maybe .05% about. This way I don't need to put myself out there, this way I can learn and absorb more information than I have to actually dispel. That is my preference when it comes to writing and communicating. It also makes me a humongous nerd who enjoys writing boring non-fiction papers about X, Y, and Z that may hypothetically impact 11% of the population on dot of land in the Pacific. I am not someone who is going to run for public office, I would rather be the someone who advises the public office on what to do and how.

This is why when I began the blog my posts took on a more "Advice-on-living-with-O.I." slant. I advised parents on how to travel with a wheelchair, I advised teens on how to get through high school, I advised classroom aids of students with special needs on what makes a great aide.. And then I quickly realized that I haven't really lived enough to be dispelling so much advice left and right!
But what do I have endless material on? My thoughts. I am a thinker, and probably way too much of one to the extent it can be more harmful than helpful. So I reach into those thoughts, and I practice getting uncomfortable and sharing those thoughts-I'd-rather-not-talk-about with a few hundred people I've never met. See? When I break it down like that you can see why blogging is not easy for me.
For an extremely private, library-book-nerd person yes -- that absolutely does freak me out if I really let myself think about it! Which is why I don't. Instead I think about each post like I'm talking to just one person in my mind. That reader is someone who has, over this year and a half process, helped me to see the value in sharing an aspect of myself no matter how convoluted and wordy it ends up being :-)

Basically this is only easy for me because the reader makes it easy. Thanks.

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Dear Wheelchair,

By | Published Monday, February 13, 2012


Before you came along there was the stroller, a carriage that my parents would pop me into as we went around Disney World -  I sat alongside my younger brother who is seven years younger than me. (A ten year old girl wants very little to do with her three year old brother, never mind be mistaken as fraternal twins). And before the stroller it was the gracious and gentle arms of adults (usually my parents). Sure, through these means of height and transportation I was able to see much of the world (I saw the Great Wall of China in a baby carrier on dad's back), but I didin't really learn how to experience life until you came along.

Before I had a pet rock or attempted to grow my baby pumpkin that we picked in Kindergarten, you had already taught me what it means to care for something else. You showed me why it's important to keep your quick-release button axles well oiled and cleaned; you showed me what it means to give a little when it came time to release the tightness in your brakes (so I could brake on my own!); or what it means to grow with a person when it was finally time to lower the foot plate another notch (you sat there silently glowing back at me with pride). And don't think that your selfless accommodations have gone unnoticed! I appreciate the countless times when you've extended leg rests to ensure that the gigantic cast on my leg is properly elevated. And when the doctor tells me that he can't see the fracture in my ribs, the way you tilt back ever so slightly lets me know you care about making sure I can still breathe easily. You're there with me through sickness and in health.

My upper body strength has increased exponentially over the years thanks to you. Though I don't have a career in weight lifting or body building, the pay-off has been huge! Up until a few months ago, the last time I broke my arm was sometime in middle school - more than 10 years ago!! At the start of each school year I loved racing around the newly cleaned gymnasium, popping wheelies and doing donuts as I whipped around the pretend ice rink in my head. I'm so glad that you have been able to share that joy with my peers who aren't in wheelchairs, a part of me almost wanted them to be jealous of what we could do and they could not.
On the flip side you are usually the closest thing to me when it's my turn to feel jealous and sit on the sidelines, watching everyone else. Your lap becomes the place where I am able to grow silently sullen, your sense of tough love is apparent as you remain rigid while I slump a little in the seat. You're the space that allows me to feel pitiful without judgment or condescension. But when the moment is over you remind me that it's time to move; you remind me that I have to literally roll myself along because I have a choice, at the end of the day, will I choose to push myself along or will I allow myself to sit there along the sidelines? I'm thankful that whichever choice I make you've literally got my back. 

People who see you and think "wheelchair bound," "handicapped," or "wheelchair dependent" really have no idea what they're talking about. Their lack of understanding fails to take into account the fact that like any other successful relationship, this is a two-way street. I am not always using you, and you're not just some mobility device that is forever accommodating me. Most of those people weren't there when, together, we learned how to open doors that didn't have automatic-buttons; and the two of us know that there was nothing "wheelchair dependent" about showing the conductor of the train how to operate the lift on public transportation railways.
The two of us also know that there is nothing "handicapped" about being able to run someone's feet over, especially if the person had it coming - there is a power and self-righteousness about the position you put me in in society. As I have gotten older you've showed me more of these instances: how to recognize them, what to do, how to act, where to park, how to leverage your four wheels and cushioned seat in a way that allows us to roll onwards to success. These are things that my parents and teachers couldn't have taught me even if they tried - it had to come from you. 

Well, I just wanted to take some time to write a thank you letter of appreciation. I appreciate how you've helped me to experience life in more ways than anyone else could ever dream up. Please know that even though I get annoyed when your wheel bearings give me trouble, and that I complain about your lack of automatic umbrella to shield us both on rainy days - I really couldn't have sped along without you rain or shine. 


Sincerely yours,
Sandy 

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