No one reads this blog, so I'll recap some events. In November, I got arthroscopic surgery on my left knee because I could no longer stand the constant pain I was in and it was hoped that the surgery would alleviate some of that pain. The fact that the surgery would possibly allow me to walk without a cane for the first time since 2001 almost didn't matter. The success rate was low, but the pain was terrible and I had to risk it.
The surgery worked. Mostly. I should be off the cane by the end of the summer. The doctor says I'll still have to carry a folding cane in my bag, "probably forever" "just in case", but if I hadn't gotten the surgery I'd have been an almost full-time wheelchair user within a year or two.
The pain, however, has improved, but is not gone. Not by a long shot.
I said, often, that if I was just on the cane but did not hurt, I would never have even considered the surgery. And now, after I got it - I'm getting off the cane, but I still hurt. Add to that all my other health issues, most importantly my mental illnesses, and I have gone from visibly disabled to invisibly disabled.
Before the surgery I was afraid that if I could walk normally I'd lose my identity. If I was no longer disabled, I'd cease to be me. I knew that was wrong on many levels, mainly being my disabilities do not define me, but also that even after I'm no longer visibly disabled I'll still be invisibly disabled.
I've always considered other invisibly disabled people to be disabled, so why am I having such a hard time wrapping my head around my mental illnesses, health problems and nerve damage counting?
Not only that, but I feel like I've betrayed the disabled community. When I next see wheelchair-using acquaintances in situations where I would have previously needed to use my wheelchair (like at a comic book convention for example), what will I say? I've formed bonds of solidarity spending nearly a decade being a fairly militant crip. Now I've gone all walky.
I didn't mean to be a traitor to the cause, I just wanted to not hurt all the time. And I couldn't even get that. I feel like I betrayed you all, and for what?
I'm going to keep fighting as I always have, but I don't know what good it will do anymore. When I continue to fight for curb cuts and increased handicapped parking as a person with no mobility issues, I imagine I'll have a hard time being taken seriously.
I don't know why I feel this way. Everyone I know tells me I'm being ridiculous, but they're all able-bodied and mentally-well. This is the first time I've said this to anyone in the disabled community.
So, this is my confession. I'm a disablist, I'm a self-hating crip. Or am I about to lose the right to use that word?
Right now my bipolar is Slightly Depressed.
Right now my pain level is 6.5.
By the way, if you're interested, you can check out my other writing at my geek news website, The Nerd Signal.
By the way, if you're interested, you can check out my other writing at my geek news website, The Nerd Signal.
