I don’t understand why people do it. That’s a lie I do understand it. I just don’t like it.
Today someone gave me “advice” that I didn’t ask for, and it’s less what they said and more the implications that came with what they said.
I was travelling with someone else who need some assistance to walk independently. This could not be achieved safely on the pavements, due to the uneven nature of the pavements, and so it was safer for us to be in the road.
But someone decided to pull up and inform me that doing this was dangerous. The way you would tell a child not to walk in the road, or play in the street as they say.
Firstly I am an adult. I am cable of keeping myself, and the person I was with, safe. You wouldn’t assume a non- disabled person wasn’t able to do this, so why are you assuming this of a disabled person?
Secondly, if you see a disabled person doing something you don’t understand, don’t immediately assume they’re doing it wrong. A lot of disabled people learn how to do things safely, but differently to how you might consider something should be done. You’d be better of assuming that they just know what they’re doing unless you are sure they aren’t.
I promise you, no disabled person, and especially no wheelchair user, is going in the road for fun. Pavements are a lot less accessible than you might realise.
I promise I know how to exist in an inaccessible world as a disabled person. I’ve been doing it long enough.
Your advice isn’t needed or wanted, and is frankly very insulting.
Due to a lot of the world around me being massively inaccessible, I almost always learn specific routes when I travel in well known areas. This is something now do without thinking because I’m so used to doing it, and I often don’t realise I’ve done it until I route I take has to change for some reason.
I only have to do a regular route a few times before I find ways that are comfortable to me. These are ways that are often so specific, they include travelling on a specific side of the road. I’ve even missed shops that are on the other side of the road to the route I’m taking, because I’m so focused on the way I have learnt to go.
When I have to change a route it can actually be quite scary and sometimes disorienting. One reason for this can be because I don’t know the condition of the pavements I will be on, or where drop curbs are. Sometimes I have to just change curbs that are new to me, because I can’t always tell how big a drop is going to be when I’m on the pavement. And as I can’t always see exactly where my wheels are, sometimes I hit pot holes, that I was unaware of previously.
To put it simply, I have to pay a lot more attention and take more risks when I travel on routes that are unfamiliar to me, so I obviously don’t like to do this.
Now I am able to manage better than some, when changing routes, despite my difficulties. For some being able to follow specific routes that they have learnt is more important than it is for me.
The point of this post is to hopefully remind anyone reading it that sometimes people have learnt routes for specific reasons, and they can’t just change them. Some obstructions like road works are unavoidable, what I mean by that is they require the say of the council not individuals to prevent. But individual pavement obstructions, such as where you park your car, is a different story.
It is worth remembering that people can’t just change routes. They can’t always just cross over to the other side of the road, to pass the obstruction you create.
So have a little consideration for where you park or leave things on the pavement. Just remember you may be blocking a path that is someone’s only way of travelling somewhere independently.
I am aware that this post may be considered slightly ironic given my current situation which makes travel difficult. But as I’ve had to explain this recently to others, after sharing pavement obstructions by hedges and vehicles, I thought it was worth also going over here as well.
So tonight I went to an acoustic concert, very nice and a different experience. But this post isn’t about the concert, it’s about getting to the concert.
As this was at a venue that they had not been to before, I had to follow maps in order to get there, as you do. But once I found out where it was, I realised that there was an easier way to get there. I understand that this is the case a lot of the time when you simply follow google maps. But when you’re disabled this can be a lot more complicated.
The route that google sent me had me going on the road, and on an even pavements that I nearly tipped on. The route that I figured out on the way home had pavements that were a lot smoother and a lot wider.
I’m not exactly sure how this would be done, but I feel like Google Maps needs a feature that highlights the accessibility of areas better. it has gotten better by giving accessible routes at least in my area over public transport. But this does not seem to apply to roots that you would walk.
The takeaway from this post is, is of course to leave for the venue if you have not been before, well before the time you need to be there in order to make sure you’re not late. in keeping with a past trend on social media, you may want to call this disability math. Or at the very least disability time management.
On Monday and Tuesday last week I wrote about wanting to talk about my experience of Inaccessibility on Monday. However, I then did not have the energy to write this post on Monday or Tuesday. I then in all honesty forgot to write about this due to a very busy week and a rubbish memory. But I’m going to give it a go now.
I had a doctor’s appointment on Monday which was at a different doctors than it usually is. In order to get to this doctors I had to go down a specific road that I had not been down before. This immediately put me on edge as I don’t know how accessible new roads are going to be.
Parked on this road at the corner were a van and a car meaning that I had to go on the road to pass. Meaning that I had to go on the road, over a bump in the road to ensure level access back onto the pavement. Returning up the road I was unable to see where this bump was to ensure my level access. So I ended up crossing the road about halfway down to get to the other side and back up the road.
This was all because of vehicles that parked on pavements without considering those who used the pavements.
Image Description: The picture shows a red vehicle parked next to a pole behind a crossing. Next to this vehicle is another vehicle slightly out of shot. The pavement which both these vehicles are parked on is covered by trees.
On a road I did not know at all this entire situation took me about 20 minutes to deal with after my appointment. Someone passing by was able to help me find a safer place to get off the pavement and on the other side.
I know this may not sound like a big problem especially if you’ve been waiting a week for me to upload this post. But it was very difficult for me to deal with at the time. As I was already nervous about having to go to a new doctors.
New places can be even more nerve-racking than the actual reason I need to go to the place.
Please remember that this may be something I disabled person has to consider when brand new places. This movie reason that they are nervous or do not want to attend an event, have nothing to do with you or the activity. It makes simply be that they’re in a place that they are not used to and this adds anxiety of the day.
My apologies again that this post took a week to write. The downside of having a busy week is that it can sometimes cost you what you wanted to achieve within it.
So I went down a dead end today, and I posted about it and some of the comments asked me why I went down that road.
I don’t understand why I need a reason to go down roads. Why only certain parts of the world are supposed to be accessible to me. It’s frustrating and annoying.
I just want to go where I want to go.
Why is it not that simply for everyone else to get?
This post has been sitting in my drafts for ages, literally for about a month. I was going to say more about it. But I honestly don’t know where to go with it now so I’m just going to share what I have and trust you lovely readers to let me know if I need or you want me to say more.
On the corner of my street there is a lamppost, a lamppost it only took me 18months to notice.
Well I suppose that’s not strictly true. I know it’s there. I’ve always known it’s there. But I did not realise until the other day how it’s presence had altered my behaviour.
I chose to begin this blog as it was suggested after posting my struggles with inaccessibility on social media. Now in posting on social media and writing this blog, I chose to do both not one or the other. I think I have become more aware of areas of inaccessibility in my life. Now I don’t think of this as a particularly good or bad development in my life, simply an interesting one.
I do not mean that things have suddenly become more inaccessible to me, nor do I mean directly I notice things I usually wouldn’t notice. It’s more like the every day inaccessible elements of my life that I normal block out, because I have to block them out, are becoming more clear.
The reason as a disabled person I have to block some of the inaccessibility that I face out of my thought process, is simply because I face so much of it. It would become to overwhelming and frankly to depressing for me to actively register all of it. Sometimes we just have to get on with life.
While I know I already do this, I don’t think I realised how easily I do this until that moment. Until the moment I realised that I simply built my life around the existence of a lamppost.
I vaguely remember trying to get round it when I first moved into this home. But it scared me as it is near a curb edge so I didn’t want to do so again. And so for that reason, I guess I just never tried to do it again.
This behaviour became so ingrained with my normal way of existing. That it has since I have lived here made complete sense to me, that I come straight out of my garden on to the road, not the pavement.
I did not realise there was anything perhaps odd about this until recently.
We just adapt. So much so that I don’t think we realise we’re doing it.
I wonder as I continuing bringing light to this part of my life, how much more I may realise that I have just adapted to. How much more inaccessiblity will come to light.
When I arrived at my puppy training class today with my little girl there was no car blocking the pavement, there were however bins that I could get round.
However even I returned this car had parked near the bins, meaning I was no longer able to get around.
Technically this car didn’t block the pavement, however because of what was already already on the pavement where this car had parked made the pavement in passable and inacessible to me independently.
Though my sister was able to help me in this situation. Alone with the dog this would have been a lot more difficult if not impossible for me to deal with.
So this event happened a week ago. After a day out shopping I came home to find a street near my home, a main street, which also happens to have a cemetery on, had the pavements almost completely blocked by cars. As you can see in the video, I found crossing the road at the crossing very risky due to a car actually being parked on the crossing. So I attempted to go down the street, passing all the cars while doing as little damage as possible, to the point where I couldn’t. This pooh was a pole. A normal obstacle on the pavement that without the cars wouldn’t have caused an obstruction to me, but it did. So I had to turn back, and attempt getting back passed the cars without causing any more damage to the cars or damaging my chair. I then attempted the crossing despite the risk.
As I have said, the street is very near to my home and I know it well. Therefore I know that going the other direction would not only have taken roughly 20minutes to get back to the same position on the other side of the road, but would have also posed it’s own dangers to me. I don’t often used that side of the road, until after the crossing that I attempted to cross at, apart from when the bus drops off there.
I know my usual routes well, for a reason. It’s a necessity of existing in this inacessible world. Were I to go back up the road on the side I was on, I would be going against my usual routes. One route that I did that I did know, as it is part of a different route for a different task, was to go down that road. As I attempted to. My back up plan was blocked.
I was able to deal with this situation with the help of my sister, but I am really not sure this is something I could have dealt with on my own. I found this a very overwhelming situation.
Now at the time I posted this to my social media platforms, and while I had a lot of support, many people were insisting that I had to give the people leway as this was clearly an important event. A funeral. And while I recognise that, and I did at the time. I had to remind everyone that I am still disabled when life events happen.
Another interesting note is that a funeral took place today, and the pavements weren’t blocked. So this isn’t an excuse to block pavements, the blocking of pavements does not happen every time a funeral takes place. It is not a necessary and unavoidable part of a funeral. It is simply careless, and not thinking of others.
Others still matter, regardless of the event. I am still disabled regardless of the fact that this is someones funeral.
As a disabled person, I am always the one expected to be aware of others situation. As if I am always in the way I should try to limit the impact I have on other people. This translates to me not wanting to be in other peoples way, which is something I subconsciously try to do in my daily life. I am now actively trying to do the opposite.
To me, accepting that the rest of the world has valid reasons such as funerals to not include me, is purpetuating ablesim. And I don’t expect the world to change around me. But I’m done being quite about the fact that it won’t.
I deserve to exist. I deserve my place in this word. And I deserve access to the rest of the word, regardless of what is going on within it. I deserve to matter.
I deserve to be able to go out, without risking my safety and on this occasion possibly my life, to simply get home again.
So this one is a problem I don’t really know how to solve, and I hold my hands up for this one, that I am also part of the problem. Bins on the street, during bin day, alter the path and mean that someone who is unable to move the bin has to find an alternative route. This is what happened to me while walking the dogs this morning. Now as I have two dogs, I was walking them with my sister, but if I was doing so alone, this would have been an extremely complicated situation, that I don’t think I could deal with.
Now I know that bins have to be put out on the street, in order to collected. And that’s why this one isn’t such an easy problem to solve. I’m aware the whole bin collection service isn’t going to put peoples bins back into there gardens, or pick them up if they are not on the street. But these bins coupled with rubbish that often liters the street, overgrown bushes and tree routes, and the cars that shouldn’t be parked on the pavement. Make everything very inaccessible to me.
I understand that bins on the street can be annoying to everyone, but just because a problem is a problem to everyone, does not mean it is the same problem to everyone.
Something needs to be done, I don’t know what that is, but something.
The world is inaccessible enough, having to remember when bin day is, is just something extra I don’t need. It just isn’t fair that I have to make these kinds of choices when I go out. Simply because people do not want to make things a little bit harder for themselves. You will also see, if you watch the video that there was glass on the ground, and food is on the ground. These are things that are dangerous to both able bodied and disabled people as well as pets. Another obstruction that is not often considered that often effects pavements, is the way tree roots and other plants grow and become an obstruction. Again this is often a problem for most people, but it is more of a problem for those with mobility difficulties.
If you have mobility difficulties, getting off the pavement when there is an obstruction on it, is not always simple. Particularly if you are in a wheelchair. I also have to consider how I’m going to get both off then on the pavement, by this I mean where the drop down curb is and whether it is being obstructed by a car. This is sometimes the case.
There is something wrong with the way we treat the pavements, the lack of care we pay to them, and this results in dangerous situation.
Please remember that your actions have consequences that are sometimes a lot bigger than you might realise. I know that bin day does not have an easy solution, but please do your best, if you can to get your bins in as soon as possible after they have been emptied. And please do not park on pavements, while this is not illegal in itself, obstructing pavements is a fineable offence, within the UK. Parking on the drop down curbs on the pavements is illegal.
If you see an obstruction on the pavement and you can safely move it, you should, you never know if you’d be making someone’s life a lot easy.
Please watch the Tiktok video to better understand the situation that I faced this morning.
My Inaccessible Life 