My Disability Does Not Make Me Less Of A Person

It was in the 7th grade that I started to realize many of the prejudices in the world towards the disabled population. Prior to that, I knew I had physical differences and my bullies made sure I was aware of that, but this time, it really sank in.

I wheeled into class one morning, and we had to do a quiz regarding our future job preferences. They asked us some questions, and you get a result of the top 10 careers that suit you based on your answers. Apparently, I was cut out to be a high school teacher. As I scrolled down the list, I saw a lawyer and a politician a few places beneath that.

I smiled. I always wanted to be a lawyer, and eventually, a politician in my later years.

My teacher leaned over my shoulder at the results and said “I don’t think any of these careers are for you, the post secondary education is demanding to be a lawyer. Students with disabilities usually go to college. And a politician? You hardly see the physically disabled in Parliament. She made me do the quiz again so my results came up with college oriented programs.

I felt the tears run down my face. As if it wasn’t enough that some of my classmates called me horrible ableist names, now my teacher was treating me like that.

I went home crying that night. I went home feeling like a failure, and that University was forever out of my reach. I went home feeling like I’ve never be a politician or a lawyer. I asked my mother that night “why people treated me differently because of the wheelchair I sit in?”

Tears came from my mother’s eyes as she told me about the history of the disabled being institutionalized and segregated from society. She explained to me that some people still see me as less than them because of the wheelchair I sit in, they are stuck in their old ways. But it didn’t mean that I was less.

My mother and I went into the principal’s office the next day to complain about the poisonous environment the teacher had created.

The principal responded with “maybe the teacher was basing it off my test grades and ability to comprehend the material I read.”

I knew that was not true, I got 90's, except for in this specific teachers class. The principal was just trying to find a way to defend the teacher. I remember the anger boiling inside me, and I told her that I hope she understood one day what it felt like to be disabled, and hopefully she would realize that discrimination exists.

Instead of treating the teacher the way she treated me, I treated her with respect and value. I treated her like she was a human being with emotion. I learned from a young age to treat people with kindness and dignity, no matter how tempting it can be to lash out when someone hurts you. I learned that having a disability sometimes meant that people would see me as inferior

But as long as I believe that I am equal, I am. I always will be, and always have been.