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Understanding my physical challenges: An analogy

So, I've been trying to come up with a way to explain to a non-disabled person what it's like to face physical challenges at work, as a person with a disability. My current workplace is very physically demanding, even for me, a wheelchair user with long arms, full reach, abdominal muscle control and good balance. After 2.5 years of just getting on with it, despite the inaccessibility of large areas of my workplace, I'm at a point where I'm having to say, 'Enough. I can't do it any more.'. My employer is struggling to understand what's changed. Why is my workplace 'suddenly' inaccessible? What has changed with my health, to make my work so arduous for me now?

Here's my analogy*:

Imagine that you are looking for a job in the field you have just qualified for. A new employer says, if you move out to our location, we'll give you a permanent job. You just have to be able to carry 10kg. Cool, you think, I can do that. I'll uproot myself and change my life, so that I can get a permanent job carrying 10kg.

So you uproot yourself, and move to a new town to take up your permanent job. 'Welcome,' they say, 'Here is your 15kg,'. 15? They told me it was 10. 'No, it's 15kg. Here it is.'

None of your new colleagues seem surprised that it's 15kg. 15kg seems to be what everyone is carrying. And because you don't want to be the new person who can't do the job, you get on with carrying your 15kg. It's a bit of a strain, but by cutting out some social activities, getting regular physio and looking after your health, you get to the end of the year carrying your 15kg. Look at you go! 15kg is no problem at all now....

But the next year, you are given 20kg. Again, no-one else seems surprised but you. 20kg feels much heavier. Too heavy. You struggle to keep carrying your 20kg, and it starts to affect your health. You're much more tired, you're getting some niggling injuries. You go to your boss, and say that this feels a bit too heavy. You're worried that you'll end up getting hurt. The boss says, "You'll be fine. But come back and talk again if you think it's going to be a problem."

You just said you thought it was going to be a problem.

So you keep carrying the 20kg. It's getting harder. You start getting sick in ways you've never been sick before. You get injured in ways you've never been injured before. You can no longer go to the gym, as you're too tired and sore from carrying the 20kg. There's nothing in your life except trying to keep carrying the weight. You start to wonder if you can keep going. You feel like you are the only one who is struggling with the 20kg.

You doubt all of your abilities to carry things. You wonder if you are in the right job after all, if carrying the weight is so stressful and so joyless. You start dropping the 20kg. You get more sick, and more injured. Your boss calls you in 'for a chat' and asks how things are going, as there are 'some concerns'. You explain that the 20kg is too heavy for you. 15kg was more manageable.

Your boss makes it clear that more experienced workers are expected to carry 20kg. Somehow you were supposed to know that. Not only that, next year, you will be expected to carry 25kg. 25.

25kg is impossible. You know you can't carry 25kg. It will break you completely.

You tell your boss that 20kg is really your limit. "I hear what you're saying, but you're going to have to carry 25kg."

What are your options?

Pay someone to help you with all the domestic stuff you already no longer have the strength for, so that you can try to carry the 25kg? Get even more physio to keep your body together while you carry the weight? Go part-time, so that you can go back to 20kg? At least that didn't completely kill you. Or put down the weight entirely, and find a new job, even though you changed your entire life to come out here and do this job?

Until I see my timetable for next year, I won't know exactly how much weight I'll have to try to carry. I just know it's going to be at least 25kg.

* a comparison between one thing and another, typically for the purpose of explanation or clarification.











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