“I have not been handicapped by my condition. I am physically challenged and differently able.” – Janet Barnes
It’s 1 : 42 PM on day 1479 of my journey towards independence and I’ve managed to pray, brush my teeth, go back to bed, read Proverbs 17, publish my Disability of the Day feature, stretch my hamstrings, practice sitting up straight to strengthen my core muscles, feed myself peanut butter sandwich and a banana for breakfast and work on my upcoming campaign.
Today is World Cerebral Palsy Day and in honour of that I’m going to share with you 3 lessons that I learned from Cerebral Palsy. Take a look:
3 Lessons Learned from Cerebral Palsy
- NEVER give up – having the physical challenges that I have I figured out that as long as I didn’t quit I could do almost anything I set my mind to (sometimes I am unable to do things the way I pictured and when that happens I find other ways to do the exact same thing)
- All of us are more alike than we different – over the course of my life I’ve been fortunate enough to meet all sort of people and all of them have taught me that we are more alike than we different in that underneath all our labels all of us just want to know that we matter and that we are heard and understood
- There’s no shame in asking for help – on a day-to-day basis I need help from the moment I wake up to the time I go to sleep there was a time when I used to feel really bad about it but I have come to realize that all of us (differently-abled or not) need help throughout our lives