least, not in the way outsiders expect. When I look back and evaluate the most limiting, painful parts of my life, or even, more specifically, the hardest parts about being disabled, it’s just not my legs. It’s stigma, isolation, erasure, misunderstanding, skepticism, and ubiquitous inaccessibility. And that part—right there—is the social model understanding of what it’s like to live in an ableist world when you’re disabled. Despite all that, my paralyzed legs are the only thing outsiders seem to see.
