Always Disabled: Navigating Grief over a Lost Childhood
“I feel like I’ve lost my childhood to my disability.” I’ve read this haunting sentence multiple times on social media. I’ve also heard it from the mouths of disabled people in real life. So many of us relate to the feeling of never having experienced a normal childhood. Some have spent the majority of their formative […]
Me, Autism, and the Efforts to Cure Us
I lived for 15 years without having a clue about my autism. It was only after a series of life-threatening mental health crises- and my parents writing down pages upon pages of possible autism symptoms of mine—that anyone was willing to screen me for it. Even after all signs pointed towards autism, I still had […]
Don’t Pray for Me: Disabilities and the Christian Church
I will always remember the first time someone prayed for my disability to go away. It was like a slap in the face. After all, I’d made myself vulnerable by telling a complete stranger something so personal to me, only for them to tell me to just try harder. At the time I hadn’t received […]