The Accessible Stall

Happy 2018 everyone! In this episode we talk about our goals for 2018 in regard to the podcast, the disability community, and ourselves! We hope you love it and have a great year! A transcript for this episode can be found here.

It’s been a while! On this episode, we talk about surgeries in relation to disability. How much “improvement” is worth having a surgery for? What if you don’t want a surgery but have to? We dive right into these hard questions. We also talk about Seasonal Affective Disorder, which we both agree is the most apt name for a condition of all time. Enjoy guys! Happy holidays from us to you, and we look forward to giving you more amazing episodes in 2018! A transcript for this episode can be found here.

On this episode, we talk about making friends with other disabled people. And we could think of nobody better to do that with than our good friend Ashley Harris! You guys remember Ashley, right? She was our very first guest, and now she’s back to talk with us about this amazing New York times piece we all loved. Read it here. A transcript for this episode can be found here.

On this episode, we talk about how language and disability interact. In English there are tons of idioms, expressions, and terms that are related to disability. We discuss them, as well as words in general. This episode was a long time coming and we hope you like it. Enjoy! A transcript for this episode can be found here.

In this episode, we discuss awareness campaigns. Do they work? How much do they work? Are they effective? And how does color fit into all this? We discuss! A transcript for this episode can be found here.

On this episode, we’re back after a small hiatus to discuss disability hierarchy. Is it real? We discuss. A transcript for this episode can be found here.

On this episode, we talk about how to stay fit while disabled. A transcript for this episode can be found here.

NB: Kyle said “jQuery” in this episode telling a story, he meant “NodeJS”.

Notes from this episode: Emily’s Seated Workout List, Percentage of Disabled People in the US, source 1, Percentage of Disabled People in the US, source 2

The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations is a form of subtle prejudice where the people at the top of the social hierarchy don’t hold marginalized people to the standards of everyone else. How does this apply to disabled people? We discuss. A transcript for this episode can be found here.

The disability community is supposed to be a bastion of open-mindedness. But is it? Do we shun people who think slightly differently than the collective “us”? We discuss as Emily tells the story of something that happened to her at a conference recently. A transcript for this episode can be found here.

We have wanted to talk about disability and parents on this show for a long time. Specifically, the dynamic between an able-bodied parent and a disabled child. There were just two small problems: We are not parents, and we are disabled. Therefore, we had to bring in someone who knows that dynamic first-hand. The internet has tons of blogs written by parents of children with disabilities, but very few get the official Accessible Stall seal of approval. So, in this episode, we sat down with Ellen Seidman, the author of Love That Max. Enjoy! A transcript for this episode can be found here.

Who is Ellen Seidman?

Ellen Seidman runs the popular disability “mom blog” called Love That Max. She started this blog in 2008 and has been keeping it up to date since then. Aside from the fact that that’s an accomplishment in itself, she talks about her son Max who has cerebral palsy. She’s also super fun to talk with and an amazing podcast guest!

Why have a parent on the show?

We’ve talked about groupthink and defining ourselves as a community before to break down what it means to be “in” the disability community. Part of the reason we do this show is to bridge gaps by having honest conversations. Right now, there’s a huge gap between parents of people with disabilities, and people with disabilities ourselves. We thought this conversation needed to happen in order for everyone to learn from each other. Plus, hearing Ellen’s journey of learning about disability through her son is just plain cool. We get into some of the uglier parts of disability in this episode too, which is something we think is not talked about often enough.

This Ellen Seidman person sounds cool, where can I find her?

You can find Ellen at the links above, as well as on Facebook here, and on Twitter here.