When I was asked to be the 2016 Patron of International Day of People with Disability (IDPwD) I jumped at the opportunity to be involved as I am driven to alter people’s perceptions about what people with disabilities can achieve and how they can live fulfilling lives.

I believe the most difficult thing about having a disability is other people’s assumptions about what we can and cannot do.

People with disabilities just want the same from their lives as their able-bodied mates: we want to be successful, we want to travel, have families and maintain fulfilling relationships, live independently, be healthy, and to be financially sufficient. 

I am often called “exceptional” or “inspirational” by random strangers for just doing the basic, menial, everyday life tasks like buying a coffee, working, going to a pub or shopping.

I want to live in a country where I can do these things which are necessary for my existence without a token high-five or praise.

I am happy to high five anyone for the fact that I was once a Paralympian or for being an exceptional keynote speaker, however I don’t appreciate or understand why I am being praised for buying Vegemite at Coles or for working to pay for my mortgage, food and sensational shoe collection.

This Advertising Feature is sponsored by the following businesses. Click the link to learn more: 

Would you find it weird if I came up to you on the street and called you “inspirational” for being out shopping?

I was born with a muscle wasting disease whereby I am missing some muscles and I need to use a wheelchair for longer distances.

I wasn’t born missing ambition or the desire to connect with others and to lead a fabulously successful, adventurous life. I believe we have over-complicated disability and we have attached the concept of “risk” to every person with disability and this has often disabled us more than our disabilities.

Why is it “riskier” to employ somebody like me, simply based on the fact that I use a wheelchair to navigate the world and I happen to be missing my gluteus muscles?

I don’t think or speak with my gluteus muscles, do you?

Why is it riskier to have me as a passenger on a flight just because I walk a bit differently than the other passengers?

Some of these passengers are probably less fit, unhealthier, older or less intelligent than I am; however, nobody focuses on their strengths and weaknesses at check-in, they are simply treated like customers.

We will never cure disability or make the planet wheelchair accessible, however it is possible and achievable for us all to change our attitudes about disability.

An 18.3 per cent of Australians have some form of disability; however most of us are completely ignored by potential employers.

We need the community to start opening up its doors to us, to employ us, to treat us like customers and to reduce assumptions about what we can and cannot do.