Carol's Corner

Sometimes people do not want to think about, discuss or deal with disabilities or people who have them. I have run into people like this during my lifetime. Even with increased awareness, it can still be a struggle to help people understand.

My youngest daughter, Amee, has mild cerebral palsy, epilepsy and learning disabilities. Yet these three labels do not define who she is. They are simply puzzle pieces in her life. She has some special needs along with the needs we all have of food, water, clothing, shelter, love and acceptance among others. She also needs medication to control her seizures but sometimes it does not keep them from happening. At various times through the years she has needed adjustments to her medications, CT scans or MRI and EEG’s to help neurolgists offer the best possible help.

Her cerebral palsy, which affects her right side has meant physio and occupational therapy and new ways of making a hand that does not want to work properly, help her in tasks most of us take for granted.
The learning disabilities meant school work could be difficult without adjustments to her style of learning and level of ability.

Yes Amee has abilities as well as disabilities. Everyone does. It means looking past what people need help with or can not do well and searching, as we get to know them, for what they do well. Amee joined Special Olympics and began to run track. She loved to walk and after she started running found out she had an ability. She competed at many meets, all the way to the National level.

When a severe ankle injury made running track impossible she felt pain beyond the physical. What could she do after enjoying almost twenty years of running, competing and succeeding in an area the doctors said she would never be able to do? She tried boccee ball but it was not as enjoyable as she hoped. Finally she tried something far outside her comfort zone, her known puzzle pieces of life. She began to ride horses and learned to compete in dressage. Her kindness and love of animals showed through and the horse became her friend.

Amee also displays other abilities such as organizing, keeping track of things that are important to her and being kind to others. Yes some of the parts or pieces of her life are hard – ones I wish she never had to deal with but they are not all of her life. There are other pieces like organization, riding, running, finishing grade twelve with a life skill diploma and being a faithful volunteer at two churches as her work.

Everyone is unique. There are disabilities which limit things we can do in our lives but each person also has abilities. Sometimes we just need a little help arranging how those pieces might look for us.

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What abilities do you have? Are there disabilities that manifest themselves too? Let’s deal with the tough pieces while focusing on the positives.