Hi Jeremy, I was born at 25 weeks and weighed 1 pound 8 oz and have cerebral palsy as well. Luckily I have the use of all 4 of my limbs, my legs are just tighter than normal and I have somewhat limited control of the last two fingers on each hand. My vision's poor but almost normal with correction, I had ROP from the oxygen as a baby.
I've got two questions.
1) How do you feel about the portrayal of disability in media, TV, movies, books etc.? Too often it seems to me that (especially with books) characters are given a disability like cerebral palsy but then are immediately given some kind of superpower or device that lets them overcome the disability entirely. Or they're given a "cosmetic" disability like vague colorblindness so the author can still tick off the disability checkbox. I think sometimes that authors are afraid of portraying serious physical disability because they have no experience with it.
2) What was your experience like going through school? I too went through normal K-12 school and feel like I had a mostly normal experience, with some modifications; I had physical therapy once a week through 8th grade and in high school was allowed to leave the last class a few minutes early to make sure I made it to the bus pickup spot. Gym class was always a bit weird for me though. Did your schools do anything in particular to make your experience better or were you treated as more or less 'normal'? I've been out of school a good while now and still think about how I preferred being treated. There was (and is) a very intense desire to be treated the same as my peers while also coming to terms at a pretty young age that things just can't be the same for me that they are for everyone else and that it's a lifelong thing.
steelersrock0131 karma
Hi Jeremy, I was born at 25 weeks and weighed 1 pound 8 oz and have cerebral palsy as well. Luckily I have the use of all 4 of my limbs, my legs are just tighter than normal and I have somewhat limited control of the last two fingers on each hand. My vision's poor but almost normal with correction, I had ROP from the oxygen as a baby.
I've got two questions.
1) How do you feel about the portrayal of disability in media, TV, movies, books etc.? Too often it seems to me that (especially with books) characters are given a disability like cerebral palsy but then are immediately given some kind of superpower or device that lets them overcome the disability entirely. Or they're given a "cosmetic" disability like vague colorblindness so the author can still tick off the disability checkbox. I think sometimes that authors are afraid of portraying serious physical disability because they have no experience with it.
2) What was your experience like going through school? I too went through normal K-12 school and feel like I had a mostly normal experience, with some modifications; I had physical therapy once a week through 8th grade and in high school was allowed to leave the last class a few minutes early to make sure I made it to the bus pickup spot. Gym class was always a bit weird for me though. Did your schools do anything in particular to make your experience better or were you treated as more or less 'normal'? I've been out of school a good while now and still think about how I preferred being treated. There was (and is) a very intense desire to be treated the same as my peers while also coming to terms at a pretty young age that things just can't be the same for me that they are for everyone else and that it's a lifelong thing.
Congrats on your book!
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