Disability confidential. Informing. Empowering. Agitating.
Life After Paralysis is a blog that represents a variety of paralysis community members. It is a place for open conversation about the issues and the interests of people living with paralysis, their family, friends, caregivers, and the professionals that serve them.
Comments are welcome!
The opinions expressed in these blogs are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation.
(Find out more about the contributors at www.ChristopherReeve.org/contributors.)
Category: See all Michael Collins Category
The following blog is a repeat of one I posted a couple of years ago, but it is still applicable today. With the devastating tornadoes and the resulting destruction which just happened in the Midwest, it should be a wakeup call to everyone that they need to be prepared for the benefit of themselves, their families and friends. It is probably not the last reminder you will receive from me on the subject, as people with disabilities are far more likely to be seriously impacted in the event of a major disaster. We live our lives 'on the edge' as it is, and the destruction caused by a disaster of any type is magnified when we are involved. I hope you'll take it to heart. Read More
Who says you can't learn anything from daytime TV? During an interview with
Matt Lauer of the
NBC Today Show on yesterday's
Ellen Degeneres Show , I learned that M
artha Stewart has signed up as a member of
Match.Com in order to seek out romance. Apparently her action has resulted in a 30% increase in memberships on that online dating site, as many older single people now realize that such a service might be appropriate for them if it is OK for Martha.
Read More
The parking battle never seems to end. It has been over 20 years since the
Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed and implemented, and many businesses have yet to use a gallon of paint and a couple of signs to mark off parking spaces that are accessible to those who need them due to the presence of a disability. It has taken enough years that I sometimes wonder if we will ever see some universal success in this arena. Even then, the battle will not be over.
Read More
We live in a world surrounded by danger, which is obvious to anyone who watches the news. That has been especially evident during the past few months, beginning with the shootings at the theater in Aurora, Colorado, continuing through the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings in Newtown, the police standoff at Big Bear Lake in California, and might best be epitomized by the Boston Marathon bombings and the shootouts that followed.
Read More
The year of my spinal cord injury, 1988, was a very bad year. Surprisingly, I did not realize how bad it really was until some old correspondence was discovered while my sister was cleaning out my mother's files a couple of months ago. The family Christmas letter from that year told the full story, and I learned from that two-page letter that I must not have been aware of what had been going on around me that entire year.
Read More
Now that the budget standoff between the President and Congress has resulted in the dreaded sequester being implemented, there are threats, and promises, of extensive delays and much inconvenience facing air travelers in the months ahead. As someone who has experienced delays and inconvenience while flying for many years, I thought it might be appropriate to repost this blog from 2010 so that those who have not yet experienced my special kind of treatment can look forward to what lies ahead:
Every once in a while I get reminded of how special I really am. No, it is not related to “special needs.” That is a term that gets applied to people with disabilities far too often, and which most of us don't like, so I am not adopting that description. I'm talking about just plain “special.”
Read More
Okay, I admit it: I telecommute. I also know many telecommuters, and even have another family member who participates in that practice at least four days a week.
Read More
“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming ‘Wow! What a Ride!’”
—Hunter S. Thompson
I have accomplished the part about being used up and totally worn out, but I am not yet ready to skid in -- broadside or otherwise. Instead, I would like to stay healthy so I can enjoy what life is left, but need some help doing so.
Read More
We celebrate many types of anniversaries in our lives, and some of us are lucky enough to share some anniversaries that are rather unique. For me, and many of my friends, the date of a spinal cord injury that relegated us to life in a wheelchair is an annual event that is difficult to forget even if we should want to.
This year marks 25 years since that cold January day when I found myself gasping for air and unable to move at the base of a ski lift tower that had proved to be an immovable object when I slid into it.
Read More
"As the blur of the first hours, days or weeks
Turns into a realization that freedom is gone forever,
The bed becomes a prison in its own small world.
The ministering hands become symbols of helplessness
In a world of the independent.
Read More
At 42, life was going great.
Healthy, happy, active, a parent of two beautiful teenage daughters, financially secure and seemingly invincible, I wasn’t worried about what tomorrow might bring. But, in a split second on a snowy ski slope, my life changed forever. Suddenly I was quadriplegic and had -- like about 10,000 other people every year -- no choice but to learn how to live with the consuming changes a spinal cord injury brings. Read More
