Nechama, an English teacher, married and a mother of three, also uses a walking cane due to a limp caused by an accident in her childhood, wrote to me:
“I have a story for your webinar on ‘What It’s Like to Grow Up with Parents with Disabilities.’ I’m still uncomfortable sharing it publicly, but I hope my story will contribute to others…
The story took place toward the end of the previous school year. One day, my 12-year-old daughter, Noa, came home all smiles and giggles. She dramatically turned to me and to an imaginary audience:
‘You won’t believe what happened at school today! Dina, my teacher, came up to me after class with such a look of pity and in an even more sympathetic tone, told me that she was giving me the option to choose whatever role I wanted in the school play.”
“I looked at her and asked, ‘Why?’ She responded in that same tone, ‘Because you deserve it…’ I looked her in the eyes and said, ‘No, thank you. I’m fine, and I don’t deserve anything special. I’m just like everyone else. I am just like everyone else.’
“I walked away shocked… What does she think? That just because my mom has a physical disability, I’m some kind of Cinderella at home? Then I laughed all the way home—if only she knew that at home, I don’t lift a finger… I barely even know where the broom is! Cinderella? What a joke…”
I joined Noa’s laughter, and the two of us started playacting a ‘poor Cinderella’ scene, waving around an imaginary giant broom, carrying the entire weight of the household and life on her shoulders…
Noa just grabbed a drink and locked herself in her room to keep laughing and venting with her friends over the phone. I could hear their laughter rolling from the other room.
I was glad we could laugh about the situation. I was happy I was home when Noa got back from school and could share it with me. I was glad that in our home, the topics of stigma and how people treat me and my family with false pity are in the open.
To be honest, it also helped me release my frustration—not just with the substitute teacher, I hadn’t yet managed, to impress, but also with stereotypes and stigmas… And in a quiet moment with myself, old frustrations from the past surfaced—frustrations that, apparently, still exist within me on some level.
The constant need to prove myself —that I am capable. That I can be a teacher, a lecturer, a mother, that I can function. The enormous effort it has always taken and still takes, to prove that I am intelligent and competent, that my physical disability does not define me…
And in my children’s schools—each time, I invest so much. I know that when most people or teachers meet me and get to know me personally, the stereotype crumbles. And yet, I also knew that when Noa grows up and becomes a professional, she will be able to see beyond the stigma.
I was glad that all her friends, who get to know us, would develop genuine sensitivity—not fake compassion or false pity. I knew we were paving the way. Who said it’s easy??”