Tag Archives: living with a disability

The Decline of the Independence Empire

“Loss is nothing else but change, and change is Nature’s delight” – Marcus Aurelius   The end of the summer is upon us and fall is definitely in the air.  I know I haven’t published a thing in almost three weeks however I do have eight drafts on the go.  The diversity of topics could confuse […]
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Who Is the Choir?

“It always seems impossible until it’s done” – Nelson Mandela  What does it mean when someone says “you’re talking to the choir”?.  Lately when the conversation turns to access I get a lot of “it’s alright you are talking to the choir” comments until I ask them something like: Me – “Okay where could I send […]
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The Conflicts of Life

Another day of rain which is just fine.  The rain and temperature beats the crap out of the snow and the -30 (or worse) Celsius temperatures hammering the east. It has been raining so hard here today that the rain is bouncing back up a good four or five feet.  I know it is that […]
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Starting 2016 Back at the Beginning

How times change, fifty years ago I was celebrating my last Christmas as a patient in the Children’s Hospital and a year later I was attempting to catch a mud-eating goose from a pond in Stanley Park to have as my first Vancouver Christmas supper.  There has been a lot of magic deer poop dust […]
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Day of Fast

CONFESSIONS– Today is a confession day and it is also a day of fasting.  I am not fasting for religious reasons or for protest reasons.  I am fasting out of necessity.  It saddens me to say it but that has become the new way of life for too many seniors in this country.  Despite numerous […]
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Polio Diaries – Episode 4

I am going to switch gears today to discuss supportive alliances.  Polio survivors have had numerous alliances over the years and often the survivors were not even aware of them.  One of those alliances was in the form of the Canadian Paraplegic Association and by extension Canadian veterans.  Although formed to support returning WWII veterans […]
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Polio Diaries, Episode 3

1953 saw the last of the major polio epidemics in North America.  In Canada that resulted in almost 9000 cases with over 500 deaths.  That was an 18% mortality rate and that figure climbs as high as 30% for adults.  The mortality rate isn’t as high anymore where polio still exists but then medicine has come […]
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Polio Diaries – Episode 1 The Diagnosis

It was just ten days following his third birthday.  He had been exhibiting signs of the flu for almost the entire ten days since his birthday and was getting increasingly sicker.  His mom had taken him to the doctor twice and each time been told if was just the flu.  The date was June 10, 1953 […]
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What Disability?

In essence there are two types of disabilities (which is very different from diagnosis).  They are congenital, usually something that started at birth but is defined by a “condition that occurred before the age of 4”, or acquired.  An acquired happens after the age of four and could be anything from the results of a […]
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It’s Alright to Say No!

Recently I had a little back and forth with an individual that really brought the idea of advocacy back home to me and, in particular, its relationship to physical access.  I recognize access as a right and I have spend the better part of my life fighting for and defending rights.  Not just those of persons […]
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