I was 16 years old when in one moment I was living my life as an able-bodied person and in the next moment was sitting in a hospital being told I would never walk again. That is when a doctor called me disabled.
I spent the next decade working off that label. Finishing high school, learning to drive with hand controls, moving away to college, dating, volunteering, traveling the world, meeting my future husband, going to law school, getting married, graduating from law school, taking the bar exam, starting a career as a lawyer, being a lawyer, adopting, becoming a mom, being a mom, getting pregnant, being pregnant, giving birth, raising two kids.
Then it hit me...why was I working so hard to make everyone think I wasn’t disabled? What was so wrong with the D word? Nothing...absolutely nothing. In fact, I am disabled. I AM! I am strong, I am a lawyer, I am a wife, I am a mom, I am a woman, and I am disabled (in no particular order). It is every bit as much of who I am as any other label, and I am so thankful for that.
When I stopped listening to the rest of the world telling me everything disability means I can’t do, and looked at EVERYTHING I was doing, I realized that my disability, my disabled-self, was great, was enough, was more.
When I call myself disabled I am acknowledging my WHOLE self. Every part of it. And when I call myself disabled I am telling the world that it is an identity I wear with pride!