This is a guest post on the EasyStand Blog from Santina Muha.
Santina is a journalist, model, public speaker and internet
personality. She also holds the position of Communications Associate at
the National Spinal Cord Injury Association (NSCIA). She lives in NJ and has a T-11 spinal cord injury from an auto accident.
Paris Hilton. Those two words bring up dozens of mental images. The
“celebutante” can be seen on any given night partying at clubs on
either coast, with any of her boyfriends, and with any of her “best
friends of the week.” Thanks to the media and people’s own perceptions,
people who do not know her personally think they know everything about
her.
Wheel chair. Those two words, when put together, can bring up mental images as well. People
who have never known anyone who uses a wheelchair may attribute any
adjectives they believe to someone with a physical disability who uses
one. Not to mention, when you’re in a wheelchair and
people see you rolling by, whether they’ve ever met you or not, it is
common that they might assume they’ve got you all figured out.
What the general public has not figured
out yet is that being in a wheelchair is just like being Paris Hilton,
and for so many reasons.
As someone who has been using a wheelchair since
the age of six, I have come to realize that I might as well be just as
famous as the frisky heir to Hilton hotels, and if you’re reading this
from a wheelchair, then you too share similarities with Paris Hilton. Here’s why.
For me, stairs are like the Paparazzi – They often force me to take the “back entrance,” or come in through the kitchen. Many
an evening Miss Hilton and her entourage take the back entrance, as
they, like myself with the stairs, sometimes don’t want to be bothered
with figuring out a way to safely and easily navigate around the
Paparazzi.
Have you ever been asked personal questions about your sex life by perfect strangers? Too
often I’ve met a man at a bar who waited a gracious 1-3 minutes before
asking me all about my sex life and the possibilities. Well,
after a sex tape starring the eldest Hilton sister with an ex-boyfriend
leaked in 2004, Paris has become notorious for being interrogated about
her private (and not so private) sex life.
Have you ever felt people staring at you while you’re strolling down the streets? Paris Hilton does too. It seems neither people using wheelchairs nor Paris Hilton can go anywhere without “adoring fans.”
Do you have trouble finding clothes that fit comfortably while sitting in a chair? Sometimes
it is difficult achieving the perfect look when my low rise jeans show
more than I bargained for as I bend over from a seated position to pick
something up. At a whopping size 0 (if that), Paris Hilton often has
clothing “specially made” for her, as she too has trouble finding the
perfect outfit at times.
When hanging out with friends who are not
using wheelchairs, have you ever felt like the amount of extra
attention you may be receiving is affecting the friendship? Paris Hilton does too. Does the name Nicole Richie ring a bell?
Do those same friends get upset when they can’t cut the lines at amusement parks without you? Paris Hilton may receive the same resentment from friends when they can’t cut the lines at the hottest nightclubs without her.
Maybe you have a service dog by your side to help you throughout the day? So does Paris Hilton. Only her dog, a Chihuahua named Tinkerbell, does only one “service” for her – Keeps her looking trendy.
Is your car modified? Do you think you spent way too much money on your vehicle’s “special features?” Paris Hilton spent $500,000 on her Mercedes Benz SLR McLaren to adapt her vehicle to her “needs” too. In fact, according to Forbes.com,
the reason Hilton purchased this fancy sports car is because, “the
purpose of the vehicle is to put Formula One technology in an
accessible, comfortable vehicle,” thus proving Hilton sheds extra bucks
for accessibility too.
Television producers were so confident that Paris
Hilton could not function in society on her own, they gave her her own
reality show, “The Simple Life.” Some members of the
government are so confident people with disabilities cannot function in
society on our own, they give us our own reality – Nursing Homes.
At times, Paris Hilton even needs aids. The only difference is she calls them her ‘bodyguards’ and ‘personal assistants’.
Perhaps thoughts such as these helped me get
through times when I did not like “being different.” Maybe I was, as
they say, “dressing for the job I wanted, and not the job I had.” Could
it be that in the mind of a teenage girl it was easier to believe
people were staring because they wanted my autograph, and not because
they wanted to know how I “lived a normal life?”
If you think about it, there isn’t much difference between ‘celebrity’ and ‘disability’ – It’s all a matter of perspective. Like
Paris Hilton, we probably haven’t done anything to deserve any of this
“special treatment.” But like Paris Hilton, it’s the hand we were
dealt, and like Paris Hilton, shouldn’t we just make the very best of
what we’ve got?!
