The mirage of autonomy

I met my colleague Jerry on a sad, rainy and gloomy day just in front of my residence hall, in the beautiful park where was located part of the University of Leuven.
I had just travelled from Portugal to Belgium to start my master in adapted physical activity. I had my suitcase as full of ignorant assumptions as of good intentions. Jerry was just coming from the supermarket with some bags hanging from the handles of his wheelchair when I introduced myself to him.
One of the conditions to stay in that residence hall was that non-disabled residents would “help” other residents with impairments. Jack was the colleague I was supposed to help. Anyway, at the time I had had no contact with people with impairments before, similar or different to his. I had no idea of how could I “help” him and I was daunted with the thought of messing up: “Hi, Jack! How are you doing? I have heard of you already. Michele told me that you are a very autonomous person.” “Oh, yeah. I do fine, I guess!” he replied, coldly. 

So, from everything that I could possibly say, I had stupidly decided that talking about autonomy was the best way to connect with a person who was paraplegic.  I guess I did it because I presumed that the worst thing about being paraplegic was the loss of autonomy for everyday life tasks. I guess I was also telling him that I had the best expectations on him, so I would assume that if he needed something he would ask. The truth is, I was terribly scared of offending him by helping too much or of offending him by not helping him with things that was obvious he needed help with.  I don't know why I was afraid of offending him… I guess I just thought that because he was “disabled”, he would be especially sensitive and therefore I had to have extra care.
Actually, during the 5 months we were living in the same residence… Jerry and I became good friends who more often than not were firing knifes at each other. Anyway… during that time we learned to deal with each other. The most important lesson about disability it was Jerry who taught me, every time he threw stones at the ducks “they are so many, that if we throw a stone randomly, we will get some food for lunch”… or when he was scarring away my beautiful friend cat just to annoy me. Or when he tried to convince me that he absolutely needed a chocolate bar from the supermarket and so I should go there, because he was too tired to push his chair… The most important truth about disability Jerry taught me was just that a disabled person can be a bastard or an angel as much as any other person. It took me some tours to the supermarket but fortunately, no assassinated ducks to learn this lesson…
Jerry was also someone who was always there to listen, to laugh, to argue, to keep me company and console me when I doubted that leaving my country had been a wise step. What he taught me which I hadn’t been able to learn until then, was that no one, absolutely no one is completely autonomous. That this fantasy of autonomy is what separates us from our true nature. I was abled and supposedly autonomous. Jerry was paraplegic, and supposedly dependent. What a monstrous misunderstanding! In the bigger picture of what it truly means to be human, I and Jerry were just two human beings with slightly different outfits… and our relation full of quarrels and reconciliations, offenses and apologies. Everything was exactly right, then! Just as in any relation between two human beings.
These days we still talk and thankfully we treat each other as badly as ever…
But why did it take me 35 years to learn this lesson? Where were people with disabilities hidden while I was growing up? Why did I not learn more about disability and how to behave around people with impairment earlier? Where were the 10% of people with impairments while I was growing up? Where are they now? How can we learn about the difference that disability presents so that people with and without impairments are not afraid of each other? And what does all of this have to do with sport? For my next posts… 

Leuven, October 2008