Tag: Disability

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Water! Water! Part 1

People outside the UK might not know this, but we had some pretty serious weather a few weeks ago. Red warnings and rhyming nicknames have been in abundance (‘beast from the east’ anyone?…) but the majority of the freezing my weather vanished almost as quickly as it arrived, taking London from sub-zero temperatures to our more expected temperate-climate chilliness. Snow days were over, home offices were closed and the water pipes started to burst in celebratory fervour.   Continue reading “Water! Water! Part 1”

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3 Reasons Why The Chronically Ill Will Relate To The Big Sick

I usually shy away from writing movie reviews because I’m terrible at dealing with the spoiler issue.  It’s either “Oh, it was so good, and their use of Foley was amazing” or “It was brilliant, and that bit at the end when he accidentally kills….”, so you can see the problem.

BUT… I just knew I had to write about The Big Sick.  I was lucky enough to see it at a surprise screening a couple of weeks ago (Odeon Screen Unseen – if you live near an Odeon cinema and love surprises, this is definitely for you!) and, as always, put out my little 140 character review on Twitter.  However, there are so many themes in The Big Sick that will resonate with chronically ill people and those who are close to us chronically ill folks that I thought I would attempt to write a review that would shed a little more light on why I enjoyed the film so much.

(Scroll to the bottom of the post for the trailer…) Continue reading “3 Reasons Why The Chronically Ill Will Relate To The Big Sick”

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Someone Snatched My Security Blanket!

You never really know how close you are to the end of your tether until someone or something starts hacking away at it.  To the outside world it may seem like an overreaction to something innocuous, unimportant or even frivolous; but for those of us hanging from that tiny thread, it is the whole world – or at least the only sliver of the world in which we feel we can survive in. Continue reading “Someone Snatched My Security Blanket!”

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“The Music Is Outside…”

A couple of posts back I dissected an article from The Guardian that claimed that there are no true outsiders, just people faking for the coolness factor. The TLDR version is that there ARE true outsiders but we are invisible to the eyes of the author of the piece.

Anyway, a couple of videos have popped up on my Facebook feed in the last few days that perfectly illustrate both the fuller meaning of outsider status and the ableism that led the author to forget or ignore the fact that we do exist. Continue reading ““The Music Is Outside…””

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On The Outside Looking In

Over the weekend I read an article that made me roll my eyes so so hard I could practically see my brain. Eva Wiseman, a Guardian columnist, wants everybody to stop ‘pretending’ to be outsiders and admit that doing so is just a way for ‘ordinary’ people to feel ‘special’.  Am I being too harsh, or does this seem to be profoundly tone deaf?  Continue reading “On The Outside Looking In”

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3 Reasons I Am Grateful To My Fibromyalgia 

A recent Roller Derby training session had left me needing crutches just to get around my poky little flat; and, no, there was no injury involved – merely a compounding of the pain that had been gradually increasing over the previous few days.

Usually painkillers, sleeping pills and rest would allow me to return to ‘my kind of normal’, but this time the pain was persistent.  Two days later I was still hobbling and exhausted.  Eventually noticing that I had barely left the bedroom for most of the weekend, my husband came to keep me company on Sunday afternoon.  As I struggled to find a comfortable position as we watched the remake of Pete’s Dragon on the laptop, I muttered the words ‘kill me.’ A sharp jab to my upper arm made me realise that I hadn’t spoken as quietly as I had initially thought.  Once the film was over, my husband returned to his duties in the mini ‘studio’ and I turned to a playlist for solace. Continue reading “3 Reasons I Am Grateful To My Fibromyalgia “

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Wheels, Pain & The First Avenger

As I stepped through the double doors that led to the sports hall I knew I was either just about to do something incredibly awesome, or awesomely stupid. After two diagnoses, more hospital visits that I can remember, and a full twelve months worth of distance, I I had decided to return to Roller Derby.

Now, I’m not crazy; I am well acquainted with the sport and know full well that I’d be pushing my luck straight off a cliff if I recklessly attempted to become a player, again.  No, this time I planned to step into the oval as a trainee referee. Continue reading “Wheels, Pain & The First Avenger”