To be shocked some people have to be told special needs and disabled people have just as much right to be in society as anyone

[PennyRa]

By law

Thank you very much, that's good to know.

My experience out with dsd is very positive, she's loud voiced, no volume control!obviously significantly learning disabled etc and people are lovely, only yesterday the lady at the next table patiently talked about teletubbies and nursery rhymes with her, she's an adult but that's her interests.

Without wishing to conflate issues or derail, I've seen a few people suggesting that the solution to the single sex toilets/changing room issue is to use the disabled spaces instead. When asked what disabled people should use, they said there aren't enough of them for that to be an issue and it doesn't matter if they need to wait a bit.

I'm not looking to derail or conflate. I'm just pointing out that to some people, facilities for disabled people come dead last out of anything and are practically optional.

Not really, there was a post on here over the weekend from someone who genuinely didn't understand why wheelchairs have priority on public transport over buggies, so you know, some people are just not very well informed.

My local high street did an awareness session for dementia. I suggested they include Parkinson's as well. "Oh we don't have time to do that as well" I was told. Really, another 10 minutes on the session just to cover the key points? Some probably apply to anything and just mean being patient and not assuming someone is ditsy or drunk.

People are weird about any kind of accommodation. And people with no disabilities often just don’t see it.

I’m hard of hearing and recently had to go to an appointment where they had COVID screens on the desks- that’s fair enough, I don't object to that, but as soon as I saw it I knew I would struggle to hear through it. So I mentioned that I was hard of hearing to the guy who I was speaking to. He just nodded and kept speaking at the exact same volume despite me multiple times saying I was struggling to hear. I ended up lip reading and mostly guessing. Mad how often I tell people I’m partially deaf and they just nod and don’t make any attempt to accommodate it. (Or they become the hearing aid police. No, they don’t give out hearing aids like candy, my doctors all say I’m just not deaf enough yet).

I have epilepsy so am aware of discrimination. I was briefly in a group ran by a guy who had also experienced discrimination but when he claimed he had been arrested in Primark for having a tonic clonic seizure, even I didn’t believe that. I’ve been told that ‘we wouldn’t have hired you if we’d have known you had epilepsy’ so am
aware that it goes on but an arrest is a bit far fetched.

I left the group and deleted all my posts.

It's awful. I was shocked by some of the attitudes on the thread about wheelchair spaces on buses.

It's made worse by people taking the piss. I have a friend who was given a blue badge while waiting for a knee operation. She's had the operation and is fine but is still using it. If challenged she says 'not all disabilities are visible'.

I know someone else who told me excitedly that because her 10 year old had recently been diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes that the whole family would be able to request special assistance at the airport so they would be able to jump the queues when going on holiday. He absolutely doesn't need special assistance to get through the airport and every time someone does this they make it harder for people who do.

These people make it worse for disabled people. Shameful.

Leonard Cheshire have a campaign to help stop disability hate crime www.leonardcheshire.org/get-involved/campaign-us/disability-hate-crime. The stats are so depressing. Disability hate crime rose by 50% during lock down and the police do not take the abuse including physical abuse seriously.
That is even before you get to just basic manners like not moving someone's wheelchair, not stepping over their legs, not moving a blind persons cane, not touching someone without asking etc. All the simple everyday things that non-disabled people take for granted.

My experience with my 17 year with a severe learning disability is that the people we come across when we go out, are fine. We do though not spend much time in places where arseholes are more likely to be. I know someone who had a bad time in our town centre with a grown adult shouting disgusting comments at an adult with a learning disability. They did get prosecuted for that.

The other issue is that people with disabilities do not have equal access to services and that seems to be seen as ok.
Health care is difficult to access for people with a learning disability and many die early or are left in pain often leading to challenging behaviour because of it.

If a child with a learning disability needs significant support at home (greater than an ordinary PA) the default position is residential care often hundreds of miles from home rather than provide trained support in the home.

Getting support and provision is a constant battle and it isn't just due to financial constraints. There is too much of an underlying belief that some people don't really matter.

Personally I have found in general people are much more understanding of DS needs when he is using his wheelchair than when he isn’t. I think a lot of people seem to need the visual sign to understand that their is a need sadly.

however I do think sometimes even with the best will in the world meeting everyone’s needs get complicated. Take crossing points at the roads the textured surface is essential to help visually impaired people cross the road safely, but that same texture can create issues for wheelchair users. Sometimes there is a way everyone’s needs can be met but often planners simply have to do the best they can.

that said all too often planners do nothing more than the very basic to tick a box without any consideration for the end users at all. Disabled toilets are a prime example - many I struggle to fit me and DS in his child size wheelchair in so how is an adult supposed to manage? Often they have heavy doors which for independent disabled people would be a barrier to even enter to toilet. (And that’s before the lack of changing places toilets)

As well as the physical side of disability and being disabled I'm forever amazed by everyone who thinks that disabled people literally get handed ooooodles of free cash, all the equipment they could possibly need and are rolling in benefits.

Personally I'm very grateful we are out of the rolling benefit medical assessment stage as my mum has become a pensioner but the genuine stress, anxiety and crushing worry every single pip or esa etc assessment of "am i/they looking suitably disabled today? Or will they take against me because my hair is brushed and I've managed to get clothes on " "wil I get an adviser who plays fair and listens or one who writes the report based on the fact that i should have to appeal and fight to get benefits despite being disabled/chronically sick of I really 'want' them because I managed to get there and be assessed despite being in serious pain and discomfort at having to do so?" and so on.

I'm a 24/7 carer and I'm worth 42p an hour to the government via carers allowance. We and a lot of disabled people didn't even get the 20 a week pandemic uplift because we are on legacy benefits due to being longterm carers/disabled/ill.

Emotionally, financially, physically and practically being disabled/seriously ill /a carer is a constant fight through treacle with knock backs, abuse and kicks in the face on a daily basis just for trying to live a normal or as close to normal as possible life like everyone else.

I have said before caring for DS is the easy part. It’s fighting the system constantly for what is needed that is the exhausting draining part. Being passed from pillar to post trying to get support, having issues every month trying to get the right medication, battling for the basics to be in place. It’s never ending.

No, they’re both cunts.

There was a thread in here just a few weeks ago about blue badge spaces and people making their own rules up.about why they ( non blue badge holders ) were justified using them

@Eyerollcentral

“However you are wrong to extrapolate that across all society.Things aren’t perfect but it’s clear there have been massive improvements in how disabled people and those with additional needs are treated and navigate the world”

Have you not read the despicable way that some posters on are STILL treated due to their disability?

yes, improvements have been made but there is still an absolutely enormous amount to be done - and a big part of that is challenging the way that society views us.

it’s not just about kicking canes away and moving wheelchairs without permission (and it’s frankly gobsmacking that human beings do this) It’s also about challenging the more subtle and insidious ways we are still marginalised. Unconscious bias is thriving.

I'm pretty sure you can't get a blue badge for a temporary condition ,and they do have time limits and have to be renewed anyway
Anybody can ask for special assistance at the airport you don't have to.show proof of disability .

I am shocked that people STILL put "special needs" or "disabled" before the person when speaking about them, as you have done in your title.
The person comes first. So "my friend who is disabled" or " a man who is blind" not "my disabled friend" or "a blind man"

Yes I hate that train o f though "my child with autism,wouldn't behave that way ,so no child with autism should " it's a huge spectrum and as they say if you met one person with autism you have met one person with autism.

Moving wheelchairs drives me mad.

Family member is in a wheelchair and when I'm out with her it's like she's invisible, all people see is the chair and not the person in it. Most people will speak to me and act like she's not there. Paying for goods, they'll hand the bag to me and tell me the total so I can pay - I have to tell them that she's the one buying it, not me. Cafes or restaurants, they'll ask me for the order and I'll give mine then they'll ask me what she wants and I have to tell them to ask her, she can speak. When people do address her they usually use the same sort of voice you'd use when speaking to a toddler or a very old person, this weird sing-song tone that emphasises random words - "do you want a SANDWICH?.... sand-WICH?" - some of them even do a little miming action for the words they're emphasising. Then the random "helpers" who will try to push her chair in or out of the lift, up to the table, out of their way at the supermarket so they can access the shelves or get past her. It's just plain rude.

Try being autistic! People are supportive of disability as long as it doesn’t impact on them personally. They’re in favour of autistic people having jobs as long as they don’t have to work with them. They complain that autistic people shouldn’t receive benefits because they’re capable of working, but then they refuse to hire them because they “make you feel uncomfortable”, “conversation is awkward”, “lack of eye contact” etc. Either hire me or let me have benefits! It’s not fair to say I’m capable of working but then refuse to hire me because I’m autistic!

The able-bodies people parking in disabled spaces pisses me off the most. Used to have to drive my mum around and she had a blue badge. The amount of times tossers in white vans parked in the disabled bays was appalling....

You've only got to read the post about wheelchairs on buses that's been running over the weekend to see that plenty of people do need reminding.

It'd be nice if people remembered that children who are ND grow up into adults are still ND.