Quote:
Originally Posted by EzeeTiger
Your post was brave and honest and the thread is really great Adele. I appreciate your honesty. Thank you.
If someone is doing the best that they can then what more can they do? I think that I do personally make exceptions for people who are differently-abled from time to time because of what I've read about them (from disclosure in their own posts).
A few years ago on another website I used to belong to a member/online friend I had was upset because he had no resources where he lived for a service he was seeking. He kept going on about how there was no help for him. I PM'd to help. I figured how hard could it be? Since it was a major city there were bound to be the resources and meetings he was seeking. So I worked and gathered up all the info I found after spending only a few hours on it. Gave him the phone numbers and addresses of multiple locations I had checked out (there were 12 locations in his area alone, so that gave me hope he would get what he was seeking). I even got him the times his group would meet. After a few days I PM'd to see if he had checked into any of them references and he told me a bunch of different reasons why none of them panned out. "They were closed, didn't exsist, was the wrong number, ran out of funding, etc."
I have to say it was sad and frustrating. I believe he didn't even try and from my POV it seemed like he was capable of calling at least one or two of the places. But maybe he really wasn't. He seemed capable in similar areas of his life.......but we had never met in real life. He continued to occasionally post about how nothing was ever available in his area and those services didn't exsist. So, you know I just moved on and didn't bring it up.
For the record it bugs me when I see *anyone* (differently-abled or not) continually making excuses for weird references in posts or inappropriate comments and/or just about things that seem to keep happening to them over and over again in their daily lives.
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Thank you for this post.
You experience with your friend on the other site struck a chord with me. Because I've been just like your friend. The first few years after acquiring a brain injury are the worst, because you basically have to say good bye to the person you used to be. Which means grieving, and that can take a long long time to process.
I know that when in that frame of mind, I didn't honestly want answers. I didn't want help. I wanted people to do things for me. Which looks a lot different that accepting real help. By that I mean the kind of help you offered. People doing things for me wasn't really help at all, no matter how well intentioned. I have gone from not walking, talking, paralyzed on one half of my body and unable to swallow on my own to being a full time mother and spouse again. I would NOT have made it to here had I not made the choice to get busy living.
I also think your response was absolutely perfect, because it is inevitable that you are going to get sucking into the abyss of helplessness and darkness that some of us get stuck in.
I guess I am just really invested in being the same as you. and you. and you. I know I am always going to be differently abled, but there are parts of me that CAN be the same. That can only happen if my consequences are the same, and my personal accountability is the same.
I'm not asking that everyone dogpile on the differently abled people. Not at all. I'm asking people to maybe think about being real with us, to try starting a dialogue when things get said or things happen that would result in you approaching any other person.
Of course be kind and empathetic and probably throw in a little patience, but don't let things slide always just because a person is differently abled.
Most of the people on this site that I know of are pretty open about their different-abledness and pretty open to hearing people.