Today I had a conversation with a little one about 8 years
old.
He asked me, “Is your baby handicapped?”
I took a moment to think. It’s a matter of perspective. Even
those great athletes that have so called handicaps have been able to over come
them and go on to do great things.
Lately, I feel like I am the one with a handicap. Lisette
looks at life and has no questions about what she can achieve. She does what
she wants when she decides she wants to do it. Does she want to stand up? She
just decides to do it. And she keeps working at it. I, on the other hand, am
facing life with this knowledge of all the things that are behind me, and all
the things that lie in front of me and I have doubts about my own abilities to
achieve success. She has no doubt about getting to those places she wants to
arrive at. She just keeps working at them, not doubting the destination, but
being patient with the journey.
I feel more of a handicap than she ever will. At least, that
is my hope. I have no doubt that she can achieve what ever she sets her mind
to. I hope she never feels limited or pulled back, or discouraged by others
from achieving things. She, herself, has no doubt about what she can achieve.
My own journey has taken me to a place where I have been
stepping forward toward things that I know I want. I have been scared silly. I
will one day get around to writing down that story. In this moment, living it
all is so much that I can’t think that far ahead. However, I have done my best
to do for myself what I want for Lisette’s future. That is to surround myself
with loving and supportive people who at times believe in my abilities to
succeed more than I myself believe it. I see glimmers of hope and beauty and
peace in the eyes and hearts of the people that I’m choosing to surround myself
with. I can only hope and pray that I am being a good example to my daughter.
To all my children.
There is no reason to put a label on her. For those of us
who do not have a developmental disability, perhaps our doubts and fears are
our handicap. The limits that we place on ourselves handicap our ability to
move forward and to do it with a simple expectation that success will come. Why
do I need to focus so much on the time line? The time line and the limits that
I place on myself are my handicap. Fear is my handicap. My daughter has no fear
of failure. She doesn’t understand why someone would discourage her from being
anything but the best at what she can be. Her best is not someone else’s best.
Our best is as individual and unique to the universe as each of us. No, to put
a label on her, or myself is to limit our abilities. That becomes my handicap.
Perhaps, too, our handicaps are those people who happen to
come into or pass through our life and do nothing but discourage and tear us
down from the inside. It’s a hard thing to have to say to those handicaps, “I
deserve better” and to move on. The struggle is real. We each deserve respect
and encouragement to become something greater than we are. To remain sedentary
in our place and not achieve more is to waste a good life. The endless
possibilities! If our focus is so set on being whatever someone else might
think we should be, or to stay where we should
stay according to an others perception, we lose ourselves. It’s a journey of
self-discovery by constantly challenging our handicaps to become something
greater and to make a better life for ourselves.
My daughter does not, and will not if I can help it, ever
think of her self as handicapped. If that happens to sneak into her consciousness
at some point in life I hope she has the clarity to see it as nothing more than
a label to be snipped off much like you would snip off the label on a new
shirt. Handicap is nothing more than a misjudgment from others in your
abilities. Snip off that thought. There's no handicap here.

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