My Disability or ‘Diffability’ Forces Me to Go Slow

I am as slow as hair growing

“My God! Lucinda, you can do the Tai Chi Walk!”

I was walking up the hill in town when someone coming up behind me exclaimed this in admiration.

“You really have it! I have been trying to learn to move that slow for years!”

“I am tired!” was my ill-humoured reply.

His comment stayed with me, though. I kept hearing the exchange in my head, days later and wondered why.

It was because it put my disability in a new light, and that is when I started thinking that it might also have some unexpected benefits.

I worked with disabled children and adults all through my twenties, and even then, I privately used the word ‘diffabled’, as in differently-abled. Nowadays, I draw a Disability Allowance, but in my mind, I am ‘diffabled’ with a hard-won understanding of the different things I am able to do, — emphasis on the ‘able’.

I wonder if that word will catch on…. what do you think?

I used to be addicted to planning. I was under the illusion that I was in control of my life, and by extension, the future.

Most of us have busy minds, preoccupied with trying to game the future. But who can say what will happen?

Gaming the future may be a fool’s errand, but we plan anyway, of course, — from the mundane to the grandiose and everything in between. Modern life is a bullet train, going so fast it is impossible to live without planning — and there is no stop.

I was put off the bullet train. Suddenly, traumatically and painfully. I became disabled.

My addiction to planning? Forced to give it up, cold turkey, and that was the biggest trauma.

My friend’s comment that day let me appreciate a positive side of not being able to plan, which is that it forces me to Be Here Now — willy-nilly.

‘Be Here Now’ is a philosophy most of us have heard of, whether we try to follow the Buddhist way or not; along with ‘live in the moment’ and ‘be real’, it has become a catchphrase. It is glibly offered as advice to slow down, appreciate life, and reduce stress.

But if you are addicted to planning, are you diametrically opposed to Being Here Now?

I cannot take credit for now living so spontaneously. Spontaneous is the only way I can operate — even if my choices are extremely limited. It is not as if I can say ‘yes’ to an invitation to try sky-diving, for example — I cannot even say ‘yes’ to a plan to meet up for coffee. I might not be able to stay standing for more than three minutes. Or, I might. I just never know.

My diffability means that I quickly become exhausted, and any physical task is like running a marathon. Physical exertion also results in painful muscle tears. Like a spider, I can put on an initial burst of action, but then I must pause and rest, for a long time.

Pausing and resting a lot is what I do, going slow is my modus operandi. While I am there, pausing, what else to do but be present in the moment, and take in the sensory cues of the world around me?

I have a plastic watering can. On its side, it says: I Am a Watering Can, What’s Your Super Power?

Gotta love it! Well, here it is: I have become observant. It is like a new superpower. When I am waxing positive, that is. I am romanticising my illness, which in truth is very hard to bear.

I live alone without a car, and though mostly I live in the comfort and support of my bed, I must go to town sometimes to get supplies.

In town, people often remark on how extremely slowly I move, mostly in a disparaging way. That chance remark about my expert Tai Chi Walk is the exception.

My solution to being able to take care of my basic needs — i.e. to go slow and pause a lot — works for me, but it renders me invisible. That is no fun. People often push in before me in queues, which is odd, because everyone else is just standing there, stock still, as well.

One time, in the grocery store, a tourist yelped in fright right in my face, because she had thought I was a big cardboard sign!

Being so present in the moment must give me a different vibe altogether. The only beings who notice me are animals and plants. I am about as eye-catching as hair growing.

Plans be damned, and often are. Diffabled as I am, I have no choice but to live moment to moment.

Thanks for reading my story!