Trisha,
----- Original Message -----
From: Trisha Cummings <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, December 09, 1999 9:43 AM
Subject: Re: Talking to kids about disabilities


> Kathy,
>
>            So what's your point?
>
> > I would like to turn the focus on this message on adults. . .  I ran in
to
> > two adults that told me everyday for fifteen years that I could walk and
> get
> > over Cerebral Palsy later in my life.  (They are sisters.) They claimed
> they
> > loved me.
>
>
>            They didn't really love you becasue they where wrong - and if
> they had truly loved you they would have been perfect and known it all?
>
I think they really loved me because they kept inviting me to their house.
although they might not have been educated about Cerebral Palsy.
>             You may want to learn to live with idea that regardless of
much
> we love someone - it still doesn't make us perfect nor privledged to know
it
> all and never make mistakes. One assumes you love people - and you are not
> perfect - and you expect everyone to give you the leeway to not be perfect
> and make mistakes and still love you. Its a reciprocal deally.
>
>            It would be really cool if the world where full of really
perfect
> people and no one ever made a mistake - was at a loss for how to act or
what
> to say - regardless of the situation. However its not, and we are
presented
> with the first hand oppurtunity of seeing this in action and we can either
> be compassionate and gently education or we can de defensive and nasty
and
> depends on how we feel about the topic, our state of mind at the moment ,
> whether we are having a good day - etc. A small percentage of the
population
> is disabled - how you react to people - depends on how they will view
> disabilities and disabled people. You may want to make it a pleasant
> experience - they may be a voter and you may want them on your said one
> day!! What I have found is - life reflects back my attitude. I frown -
they
> frown - I smile - they smile. We tend to forget we creat our realities
> dependent on our attitudes and what we think. That why placed in identical
> situations one person breezes thru with smiles and another is bitch of the
> century. It ain't the world - its us!!
>
>                                    Trisha
>




Kathy