Category: Uncategorized
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Questions and Skates
People frequently ask me questions about my disability. I am asked: “Can I ask you what happened?” “Why do you walk with ski poles?” The best variation that I have heard of these two questions was, “What congenital anomaly do you…
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The Unexpected Phone Call
Recently, I went in for a series of routine and preventative screenings and tests. I had to have the tests performed adaptively, where I was seated in a chair versus standing to have the tests performed. As I entered the room, I…
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Burnout for People with Disabilities in Athletics
Burnout is a subject that has been widely researched in the Health, Sports, and Fitness disciplines. Studies show links between burnout and musculoskeletal diseases including chronic neck and back pain and osteoarthritis for women and cardiovascular disease in men. [i] Literature I have…
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Change
I recently read an article by Carla Kimbrough-Robinson called “Change Happens: Deal With It.” Ms. Kimbrough-Robinson writes about how change is inevitable. She asks her readers to take a personal inventory, prepare for changes, and to seize opportunities. [1] I recently celebrated…
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The Art of Training: Unscrambling A Scrambled Egg
My efforts to walk without devices frequently remind me of trying to unscramble a scrambled egg. An egg cannot be unscrambled because once heat is applied it changes the composition of the egg. Similarly, I am trying to defy existing patterns and…
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Reach Higher
A runner stands at the runner’s blocks waiting for the signal to take off. When the runner hears the signal, they find their stride, pace, and their movements fall into a rhythmic cadence. Their legs carry them a particular distance. They have…
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My Walking Journey and Lessons From Robert Frost
Robert Frost writes about choices and decisions in the famous poem “The Road Not Taken.” My favorite lines in the poem are: “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long…
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Beyond the Box
Our current health systems, while gradually changing, have taught numerous professionals in my opinion, to think in boxes, to categorize by labels and diagnosis rather than look at the sum of the whole. As a child, I remember hearing very technical and…
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The People Factor
I came across an old photograph from 1979. In the picture, I am lying across a therapy ball that is about four times my size. My Dad is swaying me back and forth on the ball, performing my nightly stretching exercises. The…
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Disability Disclosure and Accommodations
I define accommodation as any change that helps a person overcome or work around their disability. The change can be physical (e.g. moving to a different location, making additional space, or moving furniture or equipment to clear an aisle). The change…