Girls Using Walking Sticks

[Arran2024]

I saw a post about this on X this morning. Apparently it is a trend.

Anyway, I went into town this afternoon and sure enough, I saw a number of young women with walking sticks. None of them looked like they were leaning hard on their stick, just kind of walking along like it was a big umbrella.

Is anyone else seeing this?

I'm confused as to why this is on the feminism board, especially as it appears to have been posted with the express purpose to bring down a group of young women and denigrate them.

My teenager has a rare and complex bone condition, and opinions like those being expressed here are why he refuses to use a wheelchair when he needs it. Instead he pushes through and ends up needing weeks off school and extra rounds of treatment.

What, is young people having disabilities "a thing" ? Yes, sadly , and it's fucking cruel being disabled young. Especially when you "don't look disabled"

I travel pretty much everywhere by car now because I would get ill so fast if I had to stand on public transport for even a few minutes (my Myasthenia symptoms flare dramatically and I lose the ability to speak or swallow). Should I paint on some wrinkles so my disability is more believable?

Your poor son.

I sympathise. DH gets upset with me because sometimes I don't use my wheelchair out of embarrassment.

I can only talk about my service user group of whom I know what disabilities they have or what diagnoses they have. Ive referneced above the habits and characteristics of many of the clients Ive worked with over the years.

Yes its a trend, a social contagion, just like trans is/was, it will move on to other things, it always does if you've been round long enough working in MH, care and public services.

There’s a mum at my DC school who looks like a chubby toddler with pink and blue bunches in her hair, brightly patterned coloured toddler clothes like dungarees, lots of childish logos and fluffy things, her DC wears noise cancelling headphones for no reason, someone told me that the mum calls herself non binary but she has a baby too so clearly is a woman 😂

@JohnnyLuLus I have tried reporting it but clearly Mumsnet are cool about disabled people being mocked

Thank you.

This thread is fucking disgusting. Imagine if it was about race, there would be uproar. Disability is just as much of a protected characteristic.

So if you don't do this .... then its not you being referred to is it?

It’s called illness behaviour.

Oh dear. I have one to help with balance so most of the time I'm not leaning heavily on it.
I have mobility issues including hypermobility.. I also have ADHD and brightly coloured hair. And a radar key for when I really can't stand in a toilet queue.

I am also a grandmother. Does that mean I'm excused from the judging and snide comments, or am I the trendsetter that started it all?

Hi all,
We have received a few general reports suggesting that this thread is by its very nature ableist but, having reviewed it, we don’t believe it breaches our TGs.
Disability is, understandably, a topic that brings strong feelings and we take accusations of ableism seriously. But in this case we see a user raising a question about something they’ve observed and others responding in a largely thoughtful way.
It’s worth bearing in mind that visible mobility aids can be used for a wide range of reasons, including by people with invisible or fluctuating conditions but noting a social shift or asking questions about it isn’t, in itself, a rule break.
As ever, please do report specific posts if you think they cross the line (we accept that it's possible that we may have missed something in our review, of course) and please do bear in mind that you can hide threads you'd rather not see.

I was just trying to answer this point to agree when the thread disappeared last night

Yes the 'sick role' of old

Illness behaviour.

But people on this thread are making judgements about people with walking sticks and saying that’s what they do. Making judgements about people with certain diagnoses and saying that’s what they do. With no evidence or proof. People they don’t know who they’re passing in the street.

so yes, it puts me off using a stick. It puts me off telling people what’s wrong with me because I know some people like the idiots on this thread will think I’m an attention seeking drama llama who’s making it all up and making it my persona.

And yet, take me as an example. For 20 years I was judged and put in this box. Until an eagle eyed optician noticed a clue - my ptosis, and wrote a robust letter to m GP. It turned out there was a very real cause for all my symptoms. A neuromuscular junction disorder.

And there's a misogynistic element to this too as women tend to find it harder to get doctors to listen and get the right tests than men do, so we are more likely to be lumped in this category

And of course past doctors and past employers and old friends never learn that actually there was a reason after all. So they go round assuming they knew someone who was just enjoying pretending to be ill.

I’ll tell you what I see a lot of, not young people with sticks but middle aged overweight people with sticks.

Am I allowed to judge them and say I bet there’s nothing wrong with them, they’re just a fatty and if they lost some weight they’d feel a lot better. Bet they don’t need the stick at all, they’re just using it so people think they’re ill and have an excuse for their weight. Same with the fatties in mobility scooters. There’s literally one stood opposite me now, fatty mcfatty with a stick aged about 40.

is that OK to say? No of course not and if I started a thread saying that I’d rightly be jumped on. But it’s fine to snigger at younger disabled people 🤷🏻‍♀️

Yeah, the generalised judgement here makes me uncomfortable.

I am autistic, ADHD, and hypermobile amongst other health issues. Unfortunately, the truth is that for many of these are simply comorbid conditions; they don't tend to come alone. As people here know, there is a huge overlap between being autistic and identifying as trans, but equally there is an emerging overlap between being autistic and having EDS, autoimmune conditions, hypermobility and other related conditions. Naturally, you are therefore more likely to see young people who fit into these groups using canes and other mobility aids than young people outside of them.

I have a few friends who are simultaneously autistic, trans, and use mobility aids to help with invisible disabilities. Equally, I have non-trans autistic friends who are similarly disabled, and autistic friends who aren't disabled. Some have brightly-coloured hair, some wear "wacky" fashion, some don't. Some use mobility aids all the time, others intermittently. Some wear sunflower lanyards, others don't. I've had to use a cane myself to combat chronic pain in the past, and thankfully I haven't had to recently. If I do have another flare-up I imagine many people would look at me the same way; they have before. I know I'm not faking my disabilities, and I know my friends aren't faking theirs either, but none of us are carrying round doctor's notes to prove it to anyone who fancies a question. Some of my disabled friends refuse to use aids at all to avoid the judgement.

The truth is that nobody can tell from sight alone whether or not someone's disability is "legitimate," but in all honesty you shouldn't be trying to guess that at all. This kind of judgement, as demonstrated by disabled people on this thread, only serves to hurt all disabled people. We already face enough judgement and doubt, especially with the recent discussions around PIP.

It's not your business. Leave it to people's doctors.

I know you are saying this to make a point ...
But for the avoidance of doubt, a lot of people with my condition are treated with prednisolone and put on a lot of weight. "Luckily" I reacted very badly to prednisolone so was only on it for about 6 months before I had to taper , but in that time I ballooned (mainly water retention I think as it fell off as I tapered) and I will never forget the people who judged me so much for having limited mobility and being large. At a time when I was so unwell it was an additional awful layer of cruelty

Hello again

I am one of the earlier posters, a crutch user for over 10 years who is delighted to be on trend and not upset by this thread as having CP gets you used to comments and funny looks - and CP helps develops your sense of humour.

On a serious note - if any one uses a stick they don't really need and have not had it prescribed for them by OT - please don't as it can do untold damage to your back over time.

Just as bad is those ( like me) who resist using sticks and crutches and end up with spinal stenosis and arthritis because they thought limping and lurching on their bad legs looked better than the embarrassment of being seen with crutches.

Occupational therapy or NHS physio will tell you what you need - I just wish someone had spelt out to me how not using crutches would cause so much spinal damage - and of course increased falls.

The new sunflower lanyard perhaps. Show you have a disability.

The lanyards that have been roundly mocked on this thread?

They can’t - hence why some people may be using a walking stick as a visible sign . I think the sunflower lanyard is used in some instances but I’m not sure if this is for specifics like ASD.

Sounds a lot like a genuinely neurodivergent family to me, in which case the noise cancelling headphones could be a quite reasonable tool to avoid sensory overload and stress. There's over a 5 year waiting list in my area for child assessment for autism and ADHD - parents with any common sense and knowledge of neurodivergencies end up making adjustments well before the diagnoses come through when they realise what their child needs to thrive. My autistic child is unable to function in school without similar tools and adjustments, and was constantly having multi-hour meltdowns every day until their sensory needs were met.

Many neurodivergent people do not comply with fashion norms and ADHD can be linked to obesity due to difficulty with impulse control and food being a source of dopamine. I personally need to wear certain clothing styles to avoid being constantly distracted by sensory issues (not dungarees, I can't stand dungarees!), and seeing bright colours significantly helps my depression, and oddly seems to help with my concentration and focus - I'm far more distractible and prone to daydreaming and forgetfulness in visually bland environments. Also, not everyone likes grey and beige.

What that family wears or their use of sensory aids is not harming anyone, and it's potentially ableist to be mocking them.

Sunflower lanyards have been widely abused. Particularly during covid, I was on a train with a bunch of people who were all laughing about how they were using those lanyards to stop themselves being challenged for their refusal to wear a mask.

I wasn't wearing a mask either, they caused me horrendous panic attacks. The behaviour of those people stopped me wearing a lanyard which, up until then, I'd been considering as an indicator that my mask-less state was for a good reason. I absolutely didn't want to be lumped in with people like them and I was bloody angry at them.

That isn't to say that they are never genuinely used, but - as with the other issues highlighted on this thread - they are misused by some. But instead of being angry at those who misuse them and therefore devalue them, it's easier to be angry at those who point out the misuse