In our society, every group has figured out the accommodations they need to thrive and to become healthy, productive men and women. But picture this… What if the accommodation is a more flexible attitude? It’s very easy to make a door accessible for a person in a wheelchair. It is far more difficult to accept that person as an employee or as a romantic partner.

One can find success stories in Audacity Magazine or New Mobility Magazine. Yet, people with cerebral palsy remain invisible unless they appeal to public sympathy. What has happened to all the children of the past who were disabled but not severely enough to elicit that public sympathy? Where did they go? They grew up, but society’s image of them didn’t. Where were the strong political alliances that were supposed to help them? Where were the efforts to integrate?

How many attempts to sustain a job, a marriage, or a future have been forgotten? How many of us have been institutionalized, or put into the modern replacement — stuck in front of the TV. Nowhere have the leaders who claimed to be for us. #madeaninvestment.

The productive abilities of the CP Community are unmatched. We have fallen far, far, far, behind.

Today I stretch out my arm to help us all get back up.