Some people fit easily into a life of servitude, are good children and grow up into jobs providing a regulated environment. That was never me.

I hated school, didn’t study and failed any exams. Never got on with my parents and was always the naughty child and odd one out. I left home as soon as possible and didn’t like jobs with a regulated environment and went self employed as soon as possible.

I’ve always worked and studied hard in my adult life, have been very successful when I didn’t need to rebel and have always trod my own path, mostly against the instructions, advice and wishes of others – but I’ve always succeeded in my own way.

All anyone had to do was just let me be me and let me do things my own way, I never regulated others and let them tread their own path giving them as much support as I could. As a result my students have always been strong individuals and our bonds loose but powerful. You only have to look around me to see the results.

Becoming disabled, having my independence curtailed and having to rely on others has been a bitter pill to swallow. Every obstacle, every thing I can’t get to or reach is agony for me and a cause of great anger that I have to deal with. Every bit of help I need hurts. When struggling, “you only have to ask” is actually provocative and only makes me see how much independence I’ve lost.

The point of the post is that not all disabled people are the same. Some fit into a regulated lifestyle easily and some don’t. To some of us the loss of independence means that we’ve lost nearly all of who we have been all of our life and need support for as much freedom and independence as we can get, otherwise we can’t have any semblance of who we are.

Not all disability and people with disabilities are the same and shouldn’t be treated as such.