Shame On Me! But Why?

For three years, I’ve felt a certain way whenever I had to leave my house and I recently realized it was shame. I felt a lot of shame about being disabled and needing a cane.

Partly, it’s how society treats disabled people as less than, inconvenient, or somehow deficient as human beings.

Partly, it was my own ish. (As per usual.)

Fun fact: Disabled and disability aren’t bad words, or slurs.

So I have a dis-ability. That’s a fact, not a condemnation. I have a handicap; I’ll never win another foot race.

I don’t have the ability to run anymore, which makes it a dis-ability. But I always hated running anyway so it’s not the worst thing I lost, right?

Handicap as a verb means, something that acts as an impediment.

As a noun, it means a circumstance that makes progress difficult.

My handicap impedes my ability to walk. It’s a circumstance that makes ambulatory progress difficult.

I walk funny and with difficulty. That doesn’t actually change my worth as a human being, and I’m sorry to me that I ever felt like it did.

One day, while out and about with my trusty cane (this time it was the dragon one) it occurred to me that if I needed a cane because I’d suffered permanent injury in a car accident or I was using a cane while I recovered from a knee or hip replacement, I wouldn’t be struggling so much with it emotionally.

I need a cane because I developed a disease that damaged my brain and spinal cord. I felt shame because obviously, I was deficient. My own immune system turned on me, ruining not only my central nervous system but pretty much my entire life. How shameful is that?

Cuz that’s my fault.

Yeah, true story. I was embarrassed and ashamed that I have a disease that I didn’t ask for, didn’t want, and didn’t cause.

It’s just one of those crappy things, yet I was feeling like I was to blame for my medical condition. Somehow I did something wrong, something stupid, made bad choices, or somehow brought this all on myself. I wasn’t completely healthy and independent anymore, so obviously I was inferior as a human being.

For shame!

Side note: Right now I’m working through my occasional bitterness. I spent my twenties and thirties eating kale and working out a lot, behaving myself regarding alcohol, etc. I did whatever I could to prevent disability and ensure I would age well and be independent well into my eighties.

Seems like that was pretty pointless and a total waste of effort and time. I could have been eating cake, doing shots with friends, and having fun but that’s another post for another day. Anyhoo…

If I ended up with a permanent limp and need for a walking aid after being mowed down in a crosswalk by a texting driver, I wouldn’t feel ashamed. I’d definitely feel a bunch of things, but shame wouldn’t be one of them because it wasn’t my fault.

It would never be even a passing thought for me that a diabetic, or someone with cancer, should be embarrassed by their disease. Same with lupus, kidney failure, heart attacks, strokes, traumatic head injuries, genetic disorders, congenital defects, birth injuries, hypertension…

So why was I feeling the way I was?

It took a little work, but I got it figured with some therapeutic help. As usual, it’s a splendid combination of stuff I picked up in childhood, attitudes I subconsciously picked up as a young adult in bad relationships with bad people, and a couple fun personality traits I have as a result of the first two things on the list.

What an utter load of horseshit.

Amazing how often I’m kinder to other people than myself.

It’s okay for others to be disabled, or sick, or unwell, or to have challenges or deficits. It’s not okay for me! I have to meet higher standards, be better, do better, be perfect. It’s okay for other people to rest or relax, not me. It’s okay for others to need help, or even ask for it. Not me. I need to do it all myself, never being sick, exhausted, or needing assistance or care.

Did I mention what an utter load of horseshit I now know that is?

It definitely wasn’t conscious or with awareness, but wow. It’s hard to reconcile that my life is so much harder now that my health is damaged but mentally, things were much harder before my brain broke. Maybe it’s no wonder that my brain broke, given the almost 40 years of white-knuckling my way through life like a shark.

If I was always moving, always working, always trying to accomplish something, then the dumpster fire that was my psyche could be ignored by me and hidden from everyone else.

It’s interesting to me how, once I figured out what the feeling was and then why it was, I don’t feel it anymore. I go out a whole lot more now, not as much as most people because I’m likely going to be a homebody forever and leaving the house is physically difficult and draining, but going to the grocery store or pharmacy or out for lunch with friends doesn’t fill me with dread. The physical difficulty is all that remains now that the emotional burden of shame is gone.

Once again, it can be said I have no shame.