Denial of Disability

 

“Can You See the Rainbow?” The Roots of Denial

Sally French

Retell

In this piece, Sally French tells of her life being partially sighted. Being with her childhood and ending in the present with her experiences as a working adult, her main theme is denial.

As a partially sighted child, Sally French denied her own disability to lessen the anxiety of the adults in her life. She would pretend she could see things just so these adults wouldn’t be uncomfortable and worried. School and college demanded denial as well. The messages in these places were that people like her were not acceptable the way they are. They need to be “fixed.”

As a working adult, French still finds it easier to deny her disability. Even though her colleagues ask to learn about partial sightedness and want to know what they can do, she believes she is really not taken seriously. Information she shares and accommodations she requests are quickly forgotten.

The following list outlines the reasons Sally French has denied her disability.

“ 1. To avoid other people’s anxiety and distress.

2. To avoid other people’s disappointment and frustration.

3. To avoid other people’s disbelief.

4. To avoid other people’s disapproval.

5. To live up to other people’s ideas of “normality.”

6. To avoid spoiling other people’s fun.

7. To collude with other people’s pretenses. “ (Rosenblum and Travis, 2012,p. 323)

Not Blind enough: Living in the Borderland Called Legal Blindness

Beth Omansky

In this piece, borderland blind people, Larry, Catherine, J.R. and Beth, tell of their experiences with this disability. Much of what they report mimics Sally French’s account. 

Throughout their lives, these four human beings chose to do certain things so as to make other people more comfortable. They were taught to pretend, to act like people without the disability, so they would be able to fit in with members of society and maybe even overcome their disability. Of course, they could not act like “normal” people because they couldn’t see well, and how on earth can a borderland blind person overcome their disability by pretending?

Another thing they reported was not asking for help. Larry speaks about this. “Larry’s reluctance to ask for help is bound up in his desire for self-sufficiency. He said: … to find out that yeah you know damn it I need help reading this label because I don’t know if it’s apple juice or apple vinegar . . . So um, there was a time when I wouldn’t have bought it. That’s, that’s the thing that can eat at you. You know?” (Rosenblum and Travis, 2012,p. 327)

Recall/React

Denying a disability reminds me of a little girl in my class a few years ago. She had a very hard time reading and math was a real challenge too. She had push-in help from a special educator as well as a para-educator each day for one hour.

This girl was hard working, friendly and well liked. She would, however turn into a less than polite child one hour a day. She wouldn’t look at the people chosen to help her and even refused to do what they asked her to do. She always did what I asked her to do. Puzzled with her change in behavior, I asked to meet with her mother, and the special educator. Though she would not say so, it turns out she was embarrassed. She didn’t what to look dumb. She didn’t want anyone to know she couldn’t read well. She was denying her disability.

Rethink

I have to rethink how I treat and communicate with people with disabilities. Not just people with visible disabilities, but students in my classes with learning disabilities not so easily spotted. I need to understand that my kind words could be causing them to deny who they really are just so they do not disappoint me or make me feel uncomfortable. I need to be cognizant of the fact that they may be denying their disability in order to appear “normal” in the eyes of their classmates. 

I wonder why my experience of what is normal makes someone else’s “normal” seem wrong. Sally French says, “I believe that from earliest childhood denial of disability is totally rational given the situation we find ourselves in, and that to regard it as a psychopathological reaction is a serous mistake. We deny our disabilities for social, economic and emotional survival and we do so at considerable cost to our sense of self and our identities; it is not something we do because of flaws in our individual psyches.” (Rosenblum and Travis, 2012,p. 323)

As a teacher, I need to be aware that my words and actions are powerful to all students. I need to model respect. I need to treat each child as a complete, accepted, and worthy individual capable of anything.