Failed Disability Activist
I let people walk over me.
I’ve been working hard to talk about disability access and boost other people’s voices since before the pandemic, but a lot more since it started. Added urgency, I suppose. I’ve worked on it in most of the spaces I’ve been in.
And that’s become the problem. I’m so tired.
I’m taking a class I’m really excited to be in! The instructor is enthusiastic about accessibility. They know my challenges, if not all the ways they effect me (I can’t list all that, nor is it really anyone’s business). The big things are mainly covered. I’ve been told I can always talk to the instructor about anything that comes up.
I’m afraid to.
I haven’t been to a class in about 9 years, and it wasn’t fun. Instructions from doctors, nurses, various case managers & helpers, even directions from store clerks have made me wary. The cloud of ‘the always complaining and rather stupid[sic] disabled person’ hangs over me, because that’s the label asking for accommodations and being brain damaged/deaf/autistic (any!) gets you.
When someone new asks how to do something, telling them that everyone knows how to do it, they do it regularly, and to just do it doesn’t help, especially if you’re all doing it at the same time.
A step-by-step instruction, truly as basic as: You need to start at the top of the page to find the icon, may be necessary for people who are new to your group. They don’t know your procedures.
Today, I didn’t tell people this in the moment. Instead, I made an excuse and left, saying I’d watch the recording. I didn’t want them to see that I’d been crying from frustration, confusion, physical pain, and hurt from feeling like I’d been treated like a 4-year-old in a room of pushy adults, all screaming instructions at once about an array of too-complicated toys on top of my migraine.
I don’t speak up for myself in person very often. I usually don’t feel I deserve it. I don’t have much to offer, after all. I’ll deal with the ‘micro’ aggressions re: the COVID year (I wrote a response in Pages, left it there; not worth the drama). This isn’t going on Twitter.
I don’t want anyone to feel like I do.
