I have cerebral palsy and I am not in a wheelchair. It's common for people to associate cerebral palsy with a wheelchair. As a child, although I didn't know I had cerebral palsy or had never heard of it, when I did get to find out about it, I associated it with a wheelchair, long before I was diagnosed with it. Normalising disability is essential.

Disability is 'normal'

As a small child I remember seeing people with disabilities and thinking I didn’t know how to approach them. But anyone who deals with a disability, will tell you they want to be spoken to normally and treated like everyone else.

Understanding disability

When it comes to disability, there are different ways an individual can be affected, depending on their particular brain damage and differing degrees of severity. It is important we come to understand disability in its wider context, and not simply assume, or think one way.

We are normal, we just present differently

It is important for people like myself who deal with a disability, to know other people see us as normal. We may just present differently and that's to be expected. It is because we present differently that we get stared at from time to time, or have opinions made about us.

Disability and assumptions

Around disability, it is easy to assume. People assume before they've even spoken to us that we are automatically intellectually impaired and that is simply not true.

Physically we may struggle to get ourselves around, but we are completely aware of what we see, hear and think. It is exactly why normalising disability is important and why we should be treated like everyone else and with respect.