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NEW ZEALAND SPINAL TRUST 28<br />
—Teina Boyd<br />
Being in this wheelchair has<br />
taught me some lessons I<br />
never would have been lucky<br />
enough to learn had my life<br />
not taken this turn.<br />
So, while my support worker did our groceries, I sat<br />
outside and listened to this young guy’s story of how he<br />
shattered his vertebrae back in 2012, and through nothing<br />
more than his own willpower and hard work, he’s now<br />
walking and working—back at full health.<br />
(No mention at all of the amazing nurses, doctors, social<br />
workers, occupational therapists, physios, support<br />
workers, family and friends who no doubt provided<br />
massive support during this recovery ... it was ALL him).<br />
So, after 15 minutes of being encouraged to “just try<br />
harder” and demand my body out of its sleep, I was<br />
painfully regretting my choice to engage.<br />
“You just have to wake up in the morning, and want it<br />
more than anything else girl! Push through the pain and<br />
work for it!”<br />
I held my tongue with some difficulty, then asked him<br />
(when he was finished teaching me how to fix my<br />
spinal-cord injury), “So how damaged was your<br />
spinal-cord during your injury?”<br />
Long story short? It wasn’t. He broke two vertebrae and<br />
his spinal-cord got away scot-free.<br />
One word flashed through my mind.<br />
Uneducated.<br />
I won’t say miracles don’t happen, because they do.<br />
Occasionally. But do these idiots really think that we are<br />
rolling around in wheelchairs because we “don’t want it<br />
enough”?<br />
If that were really the case, and it was a matter of<br />
willpower and strength? I have a few friends in<br />
wheelchairs who would have grown wings and flown off<br />
long ago.<br />
So now the ball’s in my court, how do I reply to this<br />
without trampling on his positivity? Do I educate? Or do I<br />
allow him his ignorant bliss?<br />
Honesty, I resort to my natural tendency.<br />
Teina with her partner Bradley. She says: “Some people are not<br />
fortunate enough to have everything I do”.<br />
Smiling, I do understand his response… Some people are<br />
not fortunate enough to have everything I do.<br />
“Really. Without this wheelchair I wouldn’t have met<br />
some of my best friends, I wouldn’t have the amazing<br />
relationship I do with my son, I wouldn’t have found my<br />
dream job helping other people with disability and I<br />
wouldn’t have met my fiancé... if I could go back six years<br />
and do it all differently? I wouldn’t”<br />
I can see he doesn’t believe me.<br />
But I really don’t care.<br />
Seeing my support worker walking towards me with a<br />
huge smile ... laden with our bags of junk food, I’m excited<br />
to get back to my day. Home to see my workmates on<br />
Zoom before binging out with her, my support worker<br />
turned best mate, over the latest MAFS reunion.<br />
That’s a great Tuesday morning.<br />
Remember not everyone around us is educated on “us”,<br />
judgement is just a thing we need to deal with sometimes,<br />
and a little bit of gratitude and patience can go a really<br />
long way when dealing with it all.<br />
Love and light everyone xo <br />
“I’m really happy it worked out for you. For me? Being in<br />
this wheelchair has taught me some lessons I never would<br />
have been lucky enough to learn had my life not taken<br />
this turn.”<br />
He looks at me in disbelief, sincerely not believing what<br />
I’m saying.
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