Able and Disabled

Hey! I hope you are well! Today I wanted to talk about autism and the difficulties of achieving a healthy life balance. This is something I've really found myself struggling with over the last couple of years. One massive misunderstanding surrounding autism is that overload is purely sensory when in fact there are many other aspects which can contribute to feeling overload, including managing too much. I find that as an autistic person things that others may find easy to cope with or ordinary tasks can be a lot more tasking for myself and mentally draining, making it harder to balance lots of things at once. When I was younger I very much thrived on routine and the fact that I had very few things to focus on; my main responsibility was my education and I had particular social groups I attended on particular days, that worked well for me. Since the age of about 16 I've learnt that adult life isn't quite as simple as that, as it encompasses many other rewarding but challe...

Hey! I hope you are well and having a fantastic 2019 so far! I can't believe that we are already halfway through the first month of the year! Today I wanted to talk about cerebral palsy, a topic I haven't focused very much recently. Even though cerebral palsy affects me in many ways every single day, I no longer receive regular medical attention for this particular facet of my disability and not a lot changes in my condition. For this reason I perhaps talk about cerebral palsy a little less; it's the diagnosis I've lived with the longest and is the most stagnant. However, I recently made the decision to purchase myself a walking stick and thought this may be a good experience to share. As I have already mentioned, I don't really see any doctors or other medical professionals on the basis of cerebral palsy anymore, meaning that the decision to get a stick was entirely my own. I don't think that this fact makes my decision or use of a walking stick any less va...

Hey All! Truthfully, I have spent my fair share of time in Hospitals for both extended treatment and more immediate surgery. Some operations and treatments, while not exclusively reserved for individual conditions, can be somewhat more closely tied to disability and chronic illness. The distinction I wish to make is between treatments particular familiar within disabled communities and those which can easily come with age or less persisting illness. Many of my earlier experiences with surgery and treatment will have been far more familiar to those with similar disabilities, including cerebral palsy. In particular, physiotherapy and botox spring to mind. However, my experiences with bunion removal during year eleven and thirteen felt significantly different, primarily because this is a common procedure performed upon disabled and able-bodied folks alike. The removal of bunions is a procedure that is not as closely linked to disability as many of my previous experiences, with the dev...

DISCLAIMER: I AM ONLY ONE PERSON WITH CEREBRAL PALSY AND I AM NOT A DOCTOR. THOUGH MANY OF THESE SYMPTOMS ARE COMMON SYMPTOMS OF AGEING WITH CP, MY EXPLANATIONS MAY NOT BE MEDICALLY PERFECT AND I WILL MOST LIKELY EXPERIENCE THESE ELEMENTS OF CP DIFFERENT TO SOME OTHERS WITH THE SAME DISABILITY. Hey All! Anyone who knows me in person will know that I often joke about feeling old for my age, whether that be due to my taste in tv shows or my taste in music or my general personally. Indeed, I am an outspoken Golden Girls fan. However, the presence of Cerebral Palsy in my life does have the ability to take this feeling to a whole other level. I feel as though despite the increasing presence of both children and adults with CP in the media, discussion around the symptoms and impact of the condition focus far more upon the perspective of the child experience. Of course, many of the symptoms we experience never fully go away and the extent to which they effect you will depend upon the seve...