So I’ve been going to more concerts and events lately, and while this is great, it means explaining my disability over and over again, and apply for the accessible seating and carers support. There is supposed to be one universal way to do this, but unsuprisingly some places simply won’t take it or have different ways to send the information they deem as necessary to them.

Something I’m applying to currently has taken so long for me to sort out, that the tickets in the area that I wanted have now gone. This means that my sister who was supposed to be going as my carer, now may not be able to sit with us. And honestly this defeats the point of carer when you think about it.

Hopefully I am able to get it sorted, but we’ll see. But this one is just a reminder of the extra steps that exist in doing pretty much anything when your disabled, and the reality is that even when you’ve done all of them you might not be able to go, or you might not be able to sit with the people you wanted to go with.

To explain this better I’m going to include a list of all the extra steps I had to take in order to get tickets for this event, simply because I am a wheelchair user.

1. Firstly, I had to find out if the venue was wheelchair and scooter accessible.
2. Secondly, I had to ensure that the venue would support both someone in a wheelchair and a mobility scooter sitting together. I did clarify this in step one, but as usually the view on disability is so limited in society, that they didn’t understand what I was asking properly so I had to ask it again. I was then able to buy the tickets.
3. I had to find out if they would accept they offered careers tickets. They do, but not all events do, which is bad when you realise that whether a person does or doesn’t need a carer is not dependent on whether the venue offers the carers ticket. If they don’t disabled people will often have to buy a ticket or several tickets depending on there needs, this is part of what is known as the disability tax, the extra cost of being disabled in society. It is real believe me.
4. After finding out they would accept the proof that I have, I had to send it to them.
5. As per this venues rules, I then had to purchace another ticket for my carer, which as you know lead to me writing this post, as I have not been able to do this yet.

This is 5 extra steps that I have had to take, so far, in order to attend this event. And believe me when I say this has been one of the more simple events to figure out the accessibility of.

If the world was more accessible as a whole, and disability was simply viewed as part of the norm, I and many others would not be having to deal with this simply to have some fun.

Please forgive me if the spelling isn’t to accurate on this post, I used a public computer, so the settings aren’t exactly right for me. That said, as always do let me know if any mistakes impact the clarity of this post.