Friday 10 November 2017

Disability and Dignity

As part of my job I always ask people ‘how is your dignity maintained’? I often wonder as a disabled person if it is truly possible to maintain your dignity and earn respect. Of course, I can only speak from a visually impaired perspective. It seems to be the era to break the silence and end the awkward hence I thought I would share some of my less dignified daily experiences. The following feel like a taboo to talk about yet have most likely happened to the majority of visually impaired people.

Let’s start off with one of my daily struggles, needing the toilet! We all need to empty our bladders, but it is one of the most frustrating parts of being human. At school I would not use the toilet in a school day unless the pain of crossing my legs reached its ultimate limit. Although I was partially sighted in my school days I avoided the little girls room because it was always filled with the smokers at break and lunchtimes who scowled at you as you entered. Once in the bathroom the next hurdle was trying to establish which cubicle was free. Since the cubicle doors and the frames were all a pale grey I didn’t have the depth perception to see if a door was ajar or locked. The only way I could locate a vacant cubicle was by gently pushing on each door to see if it opened, an action I really didn’t want to perform in front of an audience. So, it was just easier to not go to the toilet.

I would love to say now that I’m nearly thirty that I no longer worry about needing to spend a penny. However, I think it is going to be like one of those poos that no matter how many times you flush they just keep floating back to the surface! Earlier this year I went on a first date. Before meeting the stranger I ensured that my train assistance guided me to the ladies prior to helping me to the exit. Whilst it was an amazing day that I will never forget, I will always remember being too afraid of asking him to guide me to the toilet. It was on the tip of my tongue on numerous occasions yet I couldn’t face the humiliation of publically announcing that I needed to urinate. Thankfully, I plucked up the courage on our second date after having some serious words with myself.

When you are in an unfamiliar environment there is no way you can avoid asking someone where the bathroom is. On the bright side once you are inside at least nobody is watching when you casually bounce off the walls in search of the loo or when you are wildly waving your hands around in order to find the flush. Last month I was on a busy train to London on the way to see Harry Potter and the Cursed Child with audio description which I highly recommend watching if you can get tickets. Anyway, I’m sure many people will agree that whoever invented button operated toilets for trains needs to be shot! Routinely, I will always use the toilet before boarding a train, knowing that it will be very difficult to do so once travelling. Unfortunately, I arrived at the station with only three minutes to spare before my train departed. Aware of my need, the train assistance sat me directly opposite the toilet. As the train trundled along the tracks I listened intently to the toilet door sliding open and close, but I couldn’t actually work out when it was available. There was a nice old man next to me who had already engaged me in conversation as soon as I sat down, a personal pet hate of mine when travelling on public transport, though on this occasion worked to my advantage as it was easier to ask him if he knew if the toilet was in use. This was obviously code for ‘please help me, I’m busting’!

The nice old man offered to show me where the open, close and lock buttons were in the toilet, right after he had bellowed to the carriage to clear the way so I could make the two steps over to the facility! With a tight smile I thanked the gentleman for his help and frantically jabbed on the close door button so I could die of embarrassment in private. To my horror the door wouldn’t close, which resulted in the entire carriage jumping to my aid. After all buttons had been pressed by various people with no success, the toilet calmly flashed an ‘out of order’ sign, which meant I had to sheepishly return to my seat and cross my legs until Euston.

A skill you acquire when you are blind is the ability to recognise people’s voices. Generally, I’m quite good at this, although admittedly I can’t put a name to every one of my 24 Brownies voices. When you are in a situation like going to a friend’s house and you know who is going to be there it makes it easier to distinguish who is who. The nightmare occurs when you are out in public and a voice is out of context. I was out shopping recently and a random voice called my name. Totally on auto pilot I replied ‘hey’ in a sociable tone. They then proceeded to come over and said ‘it’s me’! We began exchanging pleasantries whilst my brain went into overdrive trying to label the anonymous voice. It only took a few seconds for me to properly realise who I was speaking to, but my friend fully expected me to know who she was even though I hadn’t seen her for over a year!

Voices are sneaky things, they move without warning. You can be in a full blown conversation with someone then they will suddenly reply from over your shoulder when you were certain the person was still standing in front of you. Or sometimes you find yourself asking the atmosphere if they had a good holiday? A feeling of bemusement sets in until you realise that there is nobody there to respond, which makes you wonder if apparition is real.

Another issue with voices is that they don’t always tell you that they are speaking to you. The consequences of this can be fatal since the voice either concludes that you are being rude for not answering or they believe you are disrespectful for talking in someone else’s place. Once when I was waiting for a train at my local station a lady may have or may not have said hello to me. Small talk ensued until I clocked that the lady was in fact on the phone and therefore not conversing with me at all even though I was politely replying and reacting to all of her questions. Yes I felt immensely stupid and the train couldn’t come fast enough!

Social situations can be tough when you are blind and the one thing I’m awful at is greetings. Do you shake hands? Hug? Kiss? If kiss, is it just one on the cheek or one on each cheek? The best way to deal with this is by taking the initiative first, but I always forget. The amount of times someone has put their hand out waiting for me to shake it and I have unconsciously blanked them is unreal. If I’m with someone they will grab my wrist and thrust my hand into the other person’s hand whilst I psychologically face palm. I never learn. Then there are the times when someone decides to go in for a hug when you are not expecting it. The hugger inadvertently clamps down your arms and you end up giving the other person an awkward pat on the back since you can’t physically lift up your arms to return the gesture properly. It just isn’t cool. Let’s not forget the kissing dance, both of you turn your head the same way and disaster strikes as you brush each other’s lips instead of your cheeks!

Finally, there is the tricky task of eating elegantly in public. At home all of my knives have grooves on them so before I eat I swipe the knife with my fork and can hear if my knife is the right way around before I cut something. However, at other people’s houses and in restaurants not all knives have this feature meaning I might try and slice my meal with the knife upside down. Forks are fiddly pieces of equipment too. You stab a chip with the prongs, but when the fork reaches your mouth you find yourself taking a bite of pure metal as the chip failed to survive the trip from plate to lips. Sometimes, when you eat what actually manages to reach your lips can be somewhat of a surprise. For instance the food item may be larger than you anticipated or you might discover that you have just taken a chunk out of a lemon or lettuce leaf. In these situations you have to do your best to style out the munching as much as you want to either spit the food back on to the plate or contort your face into a disgusted expression. One time a friend offered me some nuts at his house and I eagerly popped one into my mouth. I exclaimed ‘these are a little hard’ and he burst out laughing because I hadn’t removed the shell! Whoopsy!

I think that it is pretty evident that maintaining your dignity and functioning as a respectful member of society is practically impossible when you are visually impaired. It can be very easy to get down, feel embarrassed or direct anger towards the public. We could hide away in our homes where we have access to a toilet, can check our caller IDs on our phones to see who is calling and drop food down us unintentionally until our hearts are content. Realistically, social isolation is not the ideal solution. Personally, I believe we just need to adopt a sense of humour, take those cringe worthy moments with a pinch of salt and enjoy living life. Everybody makes mistakes, it is an essential part of being human.