Hi, my name is Derek Davis and I am a student at Bowling Green State University. I am majoring in business education and over the course of my educational experiences I came across an activity that changed my life forever. This experience happened to occur in Dr. Mandlebaum’s EDIS 231 course in which I had the chance to experience the life of someone who was handicapped and was confined to a wheelchair. I would like to take the time writing about what I experienced that day, and the difficulties that encounter those who are disabled in our world today.
I want to begin with a personal background of myself. I grew up in what you would call an average middle class American family in a rural midwestern town in Illinois. Where I went to school in Fairfield, Illinois I was sheltered from many differences in culture, socio-economic status, religous beliefs, disabilities, and social interactions. My school was predominantly composed of protestant caucasion individuals and many of them led very similar lives to what I lived. I experienced the same thrills and disappointments like everyone else in life and thought that my experiences in life were very normal and anything that differed from my lifestyle was viewed as being different.
After my experience the other day taking a role in what other people experience on a daily basis I realized that everyone is unique in their own way and we should respect those differences. Basically each individual is shaped from their external and internal stimuli throughout life. Many people cannot help where they are born, who their parents are, how wealthy they are, or even if they can experience things in life that people take for granted. Everyone has special talents and everyone has difficulties in life, it is just a matter of perspective. I would like to take the rest of this article to talk about individuals who have to experience life confined in a wheelchair. People with disabilities can live life with two different perspectives. Some might think that their handicap will prevent them from doing anything productive in their life and they will give up. On the other hand, the majority choose to persevere through their disabilities and make something of their life and even change the world.
This is the point of where my story begins in the life of a person confined to a wheelchair. On the morning of September 11, 2008 I began my new experience and picked up a wheelchair to use for the rest of the day to experience what life is really like for those with disabilities. The very instant I touched the wheelchair I immediately felt my life changing in front of my eyes. I was looking foward to this wonderful opportunity all week. At first I chose this assignment because it was something different than the ordinary school work and something that would be fun. At the end of this experience I received much more than what I expected; I was blessed with knowing how individuals feel who are handicapped. It is a feeling that really cannot be described in words, but instead people just need to experience it firsthand to get the true feeling.
When I started out of the building I could already tell that it was going to be a long day. By the time I made it down to the first floor from the fourth floor via elevator my shoulders and hands were already getting sore from wheeling myself around. When I stepped in the elevator there were other individuals in the elevator with me. People had different reactions directed toward me throughout the day. I was already experiencing my first case of being analyzed minutes after receiving the wheelchair. Some of the people looked at me with sympathy and lent out a caring hand, while others looked at me and quickly ignored me turning their heads. I could not believe how a simple thing like being in a wheelchair could change so many people’s perspectives being the exact same person as before. I wheeled myself across campus to my residence hall and experienced things that I would have never expected before.
When I was right outside Kohl Hall I realized that not all of the handicap accessible doors worked. This posed a challenge for me because I had to use one of my arms to prop the door open while I used my other arm to wheel myself in. This took extreme coordination and perseverence and this was just the beginning of my experience. When I took the elevator up to my room I noticed that it would be nearly impossible to fit many people in the same elevator with me, it was just too small. Going through the hall many people who I know stopped and asked me what had happened. I informed them that I was experiencing what it would be like to be handicapped in our world and many of them seem interested in the concept. In fact it even came across to me that this would be an excellent program for me to do with my residents since I was a resident advisor in the building. Not many people get to experience what it is like being handicapped, and with this experience under their belt maybe they would treat those who do experience this on a daily basis with more respect.
When I reached my room I pulled out my key and unlocked my door to my room. I wheeled into my room and realized that I could not reach many things in my room that I previously could. I could not get to my books because they were on my bookshelf at least five feet high. My computer desk was not high enough for me to slide the wheelchair under and therefore I could not type on my computer. I was beginning to become frustrated with how many things I was unable to do. I found myself contemplating different strategies for doing certain activities, but ultimately I felt very unproductive that day and was distracted with things that normally I would not even notice. I don’t know if it was the fact that I was just not used to this new experience or if it really was this difficult to accomplish anything in a wheelchair. It seemed like it took at least two times the effort to do the same things.
When I went to class many people looked at me differently and it made me feel a little uncomfortable knowing that everyone was watching me. During class we watched the movie “Rory O’Shea was Here”. Being in the wheelchair made me feel closer to the characters in the movie and I began to realize the frustrations that must be going through the head’s of those who are disabled their entire life. As I was thinking of everything that people with disabilities had to go through I thought to myself how terrible it must feel to sit their entire life. My buttocks was hurting after only a couple of hours sitting in the same chair and I was sweating profusely. I cannot even begin to wonder how it must feel to experience that every single day.
The next class I went to that day was my Educational Psychology class and my teacher looked worried when she saw me. She asked me what I was doing in a wheelchair and I explained to her my project. She then asked me to explain what I was doing to the entire class and many people thought that this was a great project for getting real life experience. I had to sit in the back of the classroom when I normally sat in the front because the desks were too close together in the aisles for me to get through. It was very difficult hearing and seeing everything that the teacher was putting on the projection screen all the way across the room. I could only imagine how it would feel with someone who might also be experiencing hearing or vision impairments.
Not only did I go to class during the day but I also experienced what it was like to eat and go to the bathroom while in a wheelchair. I ate at Founders that day and it was quite a challenge wheeling myself up those steep ramps. It was also very difficult to balance my tray and wheel myself at the same time. I also encountered a worker who felt sympathy for me and what I considered talked down to me even though I was the same person as anyone else. This would make me feel uncomfortable knowing that people talk to you differently just because you are in a wheelchair. Many people around the dining room looked at me strangely when I wheeled in and sat next to my friends. I never realized before how one small thing in your life can change everyone’s perspective about you.
When I went to the bathroom the handicapped stall was not even big enough for me to get the wheelchair into. The door would not shut and therefore I had to leave it outside the stall. How do they expect people with disabilities to be able to walk under their own power from outside the stall to the inside without assistance or worse yet falling. This made me very upset and I wanted to tell somebody about my experience. When I was going up to wash my hands I realized that the sink was very high and it was also hard to reach the paper towels to dry off my hands.
Throughout the entire day of being in a wheelchair I learned the difficulties that are associated with being disabled. I also experienced how different people treat others differently based on the fact of them being different from themselves. I am ashamed of my previous thoughts that I have had based on my prior knowledge of people with disabilities. I now have a much stronger respect for them and now I know some of the struggles that they have to endure on a daily basis. I think that everyone should have the opportunity of doing this exercise because it allows them to see the struggles that are endured as well as the varying treatment that they receive. This small project would change their views for the rest of their life, I know it did mine. Hey, I even found out quickly that without using gloves on your hands that you will be all blistered up in no time. I loved this unique experience and I will never forget what I have learned. Thank you Dr. Mandlebaum!