Question. How does this make you feel? Frustrated? It’s a lot of effort carrying around red cups all day. After a while you’re going to get annoyed and annoyed, you might want to scream to the world: “Goddam it. Just get some red cups.” But you not allowed to feel like this. You meant to feel grateful. Look on the bright side, sometimes there are red cups. Stop whining.
The trouble is society is built on a model that makes your frustration seem invalid. It doesn’t understand your thoughts and feelings because it doesn’t get the red cup rule. Or at least it does only occasionally and when it suits the rest of the world. So most of the time you are an inconvenience or an afterthought.
Now imagine what being frustrated or excluded does to your mental health? It wouldn’t be great. But that’s alright because there’s only one of you, right? But what if I told you that 15% of the world lives with their own kind of cup rule. Because if you switch out the “red cup rule” and change it to any type of disability – blindness, a physical impairment or a learning disability, for example – the story starts applying to any individual with a disability and the feelings are probably pretty similar.
This is because society at large still uses the medical model of disability, which in essence argues that the disabled person is the problem in society. By saying that their disability is an individual problem it’s up to them to change and adapt to the norm of society physically and mentally. Fit into the norm or you’re not welcome. The duty of accessibility falls to the individual rather than society. From the moment society realises you’re not going to fit into its patterns you are isolated and dehumanised. Just for having a disability.
Thinking about all that and the arguments over how, or when, to fit in and when to fight for change is more than a headache or a simple frustration. There can be a large effect on your mental health. And the effects are multiple. Among the known risk factors for poor mental health are isolation; experiencing traumatic events such as bullying or discrimination; poor physical health and poverty. I can’t think of a single disabled person who can’t tick at least one of those boxes. And the reason? It’s the way the medical model normalises the discrimination or othering of disabled people in society. Put those two factors together and it’s no surprise that poor mental health is common for disabled people.
It would make sense then for disabled people to get better support with their mental health but they don’t. In the UK there are no mental health services aimed specifically for disabled people. Many services from counselling to psychiatric hospitals are inaccessible to disabled people, including not making buildings accessible building or providing a sign language interpreter. Because even at the time of crisis the medical model places the burden of accessibility on to the disabled person.
When I look back to my 5 years in the mental health system, at no point was my disability brought up in any counselling I received. Normally when you start counselling, you get asked some basic questions about yourself – your family, your sexual orientation, your social life and your life story. But no one asked or even mentioned my disability, which was pretty odd considering that my cerebral palsy had a pretty major influence on my whole experience of life so far. In fact it was so big and so influential that, my god, did I need to talk about it. And when it reached such a crisis that medication was on the agenda, the fact that I wouldn’t even be able to swallow the tablets was never discussed. Societal stigma and awkwardness around disability made its way into the therapy room. And when you think about it, that’s pretty weird when counsellors are meant to be aware of a whole lot of big “issues”. And here was I with one large and obvious issue they didn’t want to bring up and sure as hell wasn’t going to bring it up.
I can now see how I had internalised the medical model of disability and how deep it had seeped into my own thought processes. I believed that I was the problem, that I didn’t deserve to succeed at school with a disability, that I wasn’t trying hard enough. But at the same time, I believed any support offered was a sign of failure. It was a Catch 22 situation, leading me to some dark places and many months of missed school.
Five long years later, when I first heard about disability pride month, I was still apprehensive. I love the idea, in theory, but there is still big part of my brain that can’t commit to being proud and happy about my disability. I have been told time and time again that I’m the one that’s “not right” or that when I sometimes still get angry and frustrated with myself that I should be proud of what I have achieved. But it’s that old triumph over adversity narrative put out by others. I know now that I am right to be angry with the world for not being accessible and fighting against change rather than changing myself. I can now explain that the medical model of disability is the problem and that it’s society that needs to change, not me. And I can articulate why change, such as lowering the curb on the road or making public transport more accessible to wheelchairs, is a benefit to everyone. I bet all those parents with buggies don’t know the history of disabled people chaining themselves to railings outside parliament in London to make these things law but they do appreciate it being easier to take their babies out and about.
