How many of you with some kind of impairment or challenge have felt left behind because you were not accepted?  How many of you wanted to be given a chance to show your talents and abilities to the world around you? And, how many of you wanted to move forward with a positive attitude, but were held back because it was inconvenient for someone else?

What a shame it is that a country so vast, so smart, and so sophisticated turns its back on the talents and needs of the most under-developed population.  Not so much the visually, or hearing impaired; but individuals with Cerebral Palsy and other mobility or speech impairments which are either left to solve there own problems, or are locked away in group homes, or forced to be monitored by an army of social workers who want total control of there being.  Moreover, we are told time and again that we are incapable and cannot work.  We are told to our faces that it’s better for everyone if we just stay at home, aren’t seen, and collect a social security check for the rest of our lives.

How sad is that?  How sad is it that a group of people or a government of people will not accept us as human beings.  How sad is it that we are put here on this earth, but have to struggle all our lives!

What is wrong with the picture?  And, what is wrong with the world?  And why do “we” have to suffer? Why?

I can’t live with this injustice, discrimination, and humiliation any more! Why, you might be asking yourself?  Because this happened to me.  So I’m the first to balk.  I’ll be the first to admit the truth.  And I’ll be the first to share it honestly and openly with the world so that good change can come from it.

Has this happened to you?

These “experts” have only one set of options.  And these options don’t usually include making our lives better.  What’s more, is that these options limit rather than increase our control over our own lives.  It segregates us from society, and denies us our birth right and equal status as individuals and Americans.  We were put on this earth to have the opportunity to develop and make use of whatever talents and brains that God gave us.  Just because we were paralyzed does not mean we don’t have sense about us to think, act, or perform a given task, or duty we  would love to do.  Why shouldn’t we then, be treated or given the same opportunities?  Are we so ugly to look at, we have to be locked away in a closet?

Time after time, we do as we are told like good little children, although we get nowhere fast.  Once again, we are not taken seriously, and we are disrespected and discounted.  This must end!  And so must these despicable attitudes from people who make up a world who don’t want anything to do with us or change.