Noone left behind: Experiencing the outdoors as a disabled mother!
A woman with brown shoulder length hair and sunglasses smiles. She is wearing a transparent poncho over her head, and is in the rainforest, in front of a small waterfall.
No one likes or wants to be left behind!
No one!
Unfortunately, sometimes we don’t have a choice.
My family and I love to go on adventures! Together that is.
But sometimes, we are forced to stay apart.
Sometimes, because I want my son and nieces and nephews to experience all they want to experience, we have no other choice but to leave me behind.
And that hurts!
Entering the rainforest
On a recent family trip to the island of Oahu, Hawai’i, we decided to hike to a nearby waterfall called Manoa Falls. We decided to go on a whim.
To be fair, I usually check for accessibility everywhere I go, before I go. But this time I thought: “What could go wrong? I got enough strong adults with me, that if anything turns out to be inaccessible to my wheels, we could figure it out!”
Oahu weather during the day is usually rain-free. Of course, I didn’t account for the rain in the rainforest! Shocker! Just as we turn up into the parking lot, it starts to rain. In all honesty, the rain didn’t start, the rain continued to rain as it does in the rainforest. It just started to rain for us as we entered the rainforest.
Of course, not thinking about rain earlier that day, all my adaptive rain gear was… back at the hotel! And so was everyone else’s rain gear!
Like the bunch of tourists we were, my mom bought us all some of those rain ponchos that look so fancy. And we started the ascend.
Inclusive trail?
First, the road was paved. On a semi-difficult incline. But doable for me. And so I rolled on, with my family walking alongside me. The younger children asking why I was doing it all on my own and not asking for help. And the older kids reminding them that it is good for me to wheel myself, so I can gain muscle and stay active. At different moments, I would ask someone to record me wheeling. To their question as to why I would, my answer was: to share on Instagram and show that no one is left behind, no matter how hard the trail might be. Or to show how lazy I am! Lol!
A few minutes into the walk, the pavement became like gruyere cheese, full of potholes. But I kept on rolling on. And although this was not meant for motor vehicles, I saw a few cars pass by, wondering if there were truly people with mobility needs in them, justifying their use on the trail. People with invisible disabilities might need to use motor vehicles to get close to landmarks or sightseeing viewpoints.
A few hundred meters later, I asked my sister to push as the pavement made way to gravel. It had become too hard for me to both push hard to go up the steep slope with wet gloves I might add AND lift my front wheels to allow me to push over the tiny rocks. After that, my sister, nephew and mom relayed each other to push me up the hill, as we all chanted and went on our merry way. Despite the difficulties, I knew they would never leave me behind.
A difficult choice
After about twenty minutes of hard work on the trail, we still had not seen the waterfall. By then, we were soaked, despite our fabulous ponchos, shoes and all. The rain intensified, leaving us on a semi-trail, semi-river. Making it increasingly harder for me to grasp my wheels (with wet gloves) and for my loved ones to prevent them from slipping on a mix of mud and loose gravel. Our good mood still intact we decided to march on.
Several people were coming down the trail and so we asked a nice couple to tell us how far the waterfall was. Their answer led to a bit of discouraged grunt from us all when we heard another twenty minutes or so. But it is what followed that had us. As they stared up and down at my wheelchair, they added: but you won’t be able to go all the way with the chair. The terrain gets harder and harder. With big logs and obstacles in the way. On certain passages, you won’t even be able to lift the chair to go over. If you want to get to the waterfall, the wheelchair has got to go.
Well. The wheelchair can’t go anywhere without me and I without it. So I told my family to let me on the side of the trail, right in front of a little waterfall. They looked puzzled. Frozen even. I could hear their arguments battling it out inside their heads. Until I told them firmly: I’m ok. We have come this far. You better take incredible pictures of that darn waterfall to show me! I will be enjoying this baby one while you walk up. Meditating. It’s going to be good for me! And despite their saddened hearts, they went on up.
The inaccessible outdoors
The couple was right. The second half of the trail was just impracticable on wheels. We’ve got pictures to prove it! But if it had been, we had the heart to make it all the way up there – together – as a family.
My accident, twelve years ago, shook my family to the core. We knew too well what the loss of a family member does, as we had lost my cousin a few years prior. I never would have left her behind and that’s why I knew my family was resolved to never leaving me behind either. Until I would force them to, so that the kids would not miss out.
Being a mom, I never would want my child to miss out on opportunities because of my disability. The Convention on the Rights of the Child say that a child should not face discrimination due to their parents’ disability. But here we are – in the real world, where different decisions need to be taken. I try to find accessible activities to do together but sometimes, the things we want to do or want to see, were not thought out for people with disabilities. And that is a shame!
Canada’s promise to making the outdoor accessible
Canada has been leading the way to in building gold standards for accessibility. In building standards for accessibility that ensures all people can go everywhere, including in outdoor spaces like parks and playgrounds, they are ensuring that no family would have to make the difficult choice to leave one person behind.
I invite you to check Accessibility Standards Canada for more information. You can find a copy of their first public review draft on outdoor spaces.
written by
Marjorie Aunos, PhD., is an internationally renowned researcher, clinical psychologist, and award-winning inspirational speaker from Montreal, Canada.
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