If this is how hard it is for you after less than a week, please spend some time reflecting on how this might be for those of us for whom it had been months or years or decades or a lifetime.
I’ve been mostly housebound this time around for 7-8 years.
Everyone realises that becoming housebound is itself a thing that involves grief and grieving right, even absent the global pandemic and it’s consequences, even absent the eugenics and racism? It takes a while to adjust and like other griefs, some days it flares, others not
this is why this is so tricky for those of us already housebound, partly: part of what people who weren’t never seemed to get was just how hard it is to lose your mobility, to take outdoorness for granted (and if yr not high risk/symptomatic you still can), to be isolated always
My first time, I was 14, and I spent the ages 14-16 mostly in bed, in a room, doing my GCSE’s from my bedroom in the small two bed flat my parents had in Harlesden, then recovered enough that I’d make it to college 40% of the time. I’m 35 now; it still gets to me sometimes.
Go easy on yourselves; expect to rage and weep and be more exhausted than you expect to be from “doing nothing”, then multiply that by whatever pandemic rage factor feels right, then add some more for good measure. But please don’t forget us or that for some of us this won’t end.
When everything settles, you get to go back to your outdoorness, to whatever degree thats possible or safe given your local contexts.
We will still be here, inside, resting and keeping occupied, keeping each other company, building careers and lives and families like this.
We’d love to help you, but remember that watching you collectively and in the same moment join us in this place is hard for us, because we have fought so hard to be included from where we are and you have either refused, or ignored us, or minimised this challenge we now share.
On average, 1/5 of the population in Euro & white settler states is disabled, chronically ill, neurodivergent (⬆️ elsewhere).
Not all of us are housebound, but many are, at least some of the time.
We are the worlds largest minority. We need you, this reveals you need us too.
Disabled pals feel free to share links to writing / resources on this that you’d like to share below, this thread is picking up so let’s give them some more to read!
Little has been done worldwide to provide disabled people with the support + guidance needed to protect them during the
#coronavirus
pandemic, despite many of them being in a high-risk group, a UN human rights expert has warned.
#COVID19
#Disability
#UN
Sharing this in recognition of this and other calls for solidarity with incarcerated people whose mobility and freedom is coercively restricted by the state, especially since over 1/3 of men and over 1/2 of women UK prisoners are disabled (UK Gov 2012)
@zaranosaur
@BlytheByName
The past week has shown me that, just under the surface, runs a very rich vain of
#Ableism
in even some of our biggest allies. I’m dreading when this is over and the flood of “how great is it to be free” content that will come our communities way.
#Disabled
#CoronavirusPandemic