Dr Kelly Fleming

Verbal and body language play a large part in communication between abled people and disabled people. Often abled people do not realize they are saying things that are hurtful to a disabled person.

It is important to avoid using phrases like “the blind man” or “the woman in a wheelchair,” as these phrases strip us of our dignity. A disabled person’s identity is not only disability. Our identity is who we are and what we do. Each person has a story to tell, gifts to share, some may be related to our disability, but others include our families, work and other activities which we do. A person’s disability is still an intrinsic component of our self-identity. There are times we may wish we were not disabled but at the same time we acknowledge that our disability is inseparable from our personhood.

Body language and tone of voice presents a bias (acknowledged or unacknowledged) by an abled person in ways that are condescending to those of us who are disabled. A person may “mean well” but their words hurt and exclude us even more than structural accessibility.

Phrases I’ve heard that hurt the most include:

• “You are special in God’s eyes. That is why you were given this disability.” Yes, I am special in God’s eyes and yes, God gave me the disabilities that I have but not in the way that the person has conveyed this phrase to me. When a person says this to me, I feel they are trying to eliminate the disability from me, or they are trying to find a way to make themselves feel better. I may feel they are trying to emphasize with me, but the way they have worded the phrase hurts me.
• “Don’t worry about your pain and suffering, in heaven you will be made whole.” This phrase makes me feel like the pain I go through every day is not important. I don’t feel I’m suffering but I do know I experience chronic pain every day of my life. Yes, I know that in heaven I will be made whole, but I already feel I am whole. Right now, today. Why? Because my disabilities are part of the way God created me. God doesn’t make mistakes and He doesn’t create a person “incomplete.” Every person is complete (whole), so when someone says this to me, they make me feel like I’m not a complete person today but when I get to heaven I will be.
• “Thank God, it isn’t worse.” Some people would be surprised that people have said this to me (and many other disabled people), but it’s true. These words are disempowering to me and hurtful to me when I think of my friends who have a more severe disability than I do. What does “it isn’t worse” supposed to mean? Thank God I’m not dead? Thank God I’m not incapacitated in a hospital? I’ve never really understood why a person would even say these words to me.
• “God made you disabled for a reason.” Yes, that is true. God made me disabled so that I could be an extra voice within a minority community to help abled people become more aware of disabled people, our skills, abilities, accomplishments, and our needs in terms of social access, medical equipment, mobility and communication aids. However, this is not the meaning behind the words spoken by most people who have said this. When I have replied with the above response, the speakers usually are quite taken aback. And it’s obvious from their body language that my response was not what they expected to hear.
• “I am so in awe of you, having accomplished all that you have ‘despite’ your disabilities.” This phrase makes me cringe. My disabilities have nothing to do with what I can or cannot accomplish. My disabled body is a part of me, something that makes me uniquely me. My accomplishments are no greater or lesser than those of an abled person. It may have been more difficult for me to accomplish my goals, most often due to accessibility issues, but not because of my disabilities themselves.
• “I will pray for you.” This phrase is usually accompanied by a pat on the shoulder or knee, with a bent head. When someone says this phrase with the body language they use, I just shake my head to myself and roll my eyes. The person saying this to me is going to pray that I will be able to walk or to hear and my disabled body will be miraculously healed and become “whole.” The person in front of me isn’t asking me what things I need prayer for, they simply assume that I must be living a life of complete anguish and torment because I’m disabled, and I need to be healed of my disability to become “normal.”
• “I hope I don’t end up like that.” This phrase is often uttered but usually not in front of a disabled person but said as the person walks away. Being Deaf, I often have a hearing friend with me to interpret and she has heard people say this exact phrase when they are walking away from me. When she tells me what was said, I think to myself, “you say those words out loud and call yourself a Christian?” I’ve been tempted so many times to react to those words by calling the person back but then I stop myself and try to let it roll off my shoulders. This phrase is often uttered after someone has seen me with a friend who is assisting me to eat. I’ve also witnessed it being said after someone has spoken to a person with dementia, given them the shoulder pat with “I’ll pray for you.”

I see this last phrase as a subconscious prejudice that many people have, and it desperately needs to be addressed. Anyone who has ever used this phrase at some point in their life, needs to seriously consider their own future. It may not be tomorrow but some time in their own future, they or a family member or close friend may be faced with a disability.