Disability blog carnival 12 is up....

and thank you Tokah for all your hard work on this one! The theme is disability and culture. There are many great entries - go on over and check it out!

My personal favorite was Disability Soapbox written by Jules who is deaf but was in a wheelchair recuperating from injuries. He writes:

"What I WANT to talk about is what I have experienced as a dual disabled person, being deaf AND temporarily disabled in other words, I wasn't able to walk for a long long time... I found that I had to rely on people to help me go to bathroom, just for a piss or for a sponge bath, to help me get dressed and/or to help me get things I needed (such as food, books, DVDs, stuff to keep me busy.) Now if you think that sounds "relaxing and wonderfully lazy," I am telling you now, it WASN'T. ... I went back to college earlier than what folks expected. Yes, it meant that I had to go around in a wheelchair on the campus. I didn't mind that. Little I knew what was waiting for me!

Going around in a wheelchair was more challenging physically, mentally AND emotionally. I discovered personally that folks in wheelchairs are MORE invisible than I imagined. It's like the folks out there are saying to themselves, "don't see that woman in the wheelchair, let me get out of that way, I don't want her to brush by me." "If I don't meet her eyes, she'd not ask me for help." "Oh, how awful for her! She is miserable, I know!" I could go on but you get the idea.... There were a lot of folks that'd not even look at me even when I wheeled by; there were a lot of folks who'd LOOK at me as if I was a freak. Sometimes there were folks who thought to help me WITHOUT asking me if I needed help. I got furious with a man who tried to push me (in my wheelchair); it startled me so bad because I was pushing myself, and suddenly the wheelchair picked up speed than I was used to so I immediately knew someone was behind me, pushing me. I slammed down the brakes and he almost flipped over my chair/body. I had to twist my upper body to tell him "thanks, but no thanks!" Mind you, I wouldn't MIND getting help but I feel that one SHOULD ask "do you need help?"

His post had me laughing out loud at his descriptions of situations. I would point out that when one gets used to being in a wheelchair, depending on the disability, it gets easier and you can do more for yourself (again it depends on the disability). But I love his allusion to "relaxing" and "wonderfully lazy" since in my experience there is nothing relaxing about having to rely on someone else to do things for me - I find it very stressful actually most of the time and would much prefer to do things myself. (Another myth gone down the toilet!)

There's also a great post by brokenclay on hotel access (or NOT) and by lisa entitled "Sometimes I wonder how walkies survive" - well you'll see....