Spinal cord injury changes the body in ways that even people who are affected by it take years to understand its effects. Each and every person with spinal cord injury has to go through those uncertain times with fear and anxiety. I am no exception. It took me many years learn how a neurogenic bladder will cause urinary tract infection that if left untreated will lead to renal failure. I learnt that the hard way.

I was also ignorant of how a poor-fitting wheelchair will cause postural problems, why I should diligently go for scheduled medical check-ups and that people with spinal cod injury are prone to osteopenia that may eventually lead to osteoporosis. Those were the days when Internet was still a foreign word to many and resources in print for spinal cord injury were scarce and hard to come by.

Things have changed over the years. Information on complications, treatment and prevention for spinal cord injury are easily available through search engines such as Google and Yahoo. Many of such sites provide cold hard facts that may be difficult to comprehend with its extensive use of medical terms. Personally, I prefer to get my information from forums where people with similar conditions share their experiences and provide useful advice.

One site that I frequent for down-to-earth information is the CareCure Community. It has an extensive archive of all topics related to spinal cord injury where members with similar conditions share and discuss issues affecting them. What makes this forum unique is the sense of camaraderie by members from all over the world and the determination to part with whatever knowledge they have to people who need it.

During the Peer Counseling Workshop organised by the Jabatan Kebajikan Masyarakat Malaysia/Department of Social Welfare Malaysia (JKMM) and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) from June 25 - 28 at the Institut Latihan Majlis Kebajikan dan Pembangunan Masyarakat Kebangsaan Malaysia (MAKPEM), I conducted two training sessions. One of the was “How to Overcome Oppression and Change Society.” Below is an excerpt of my presentation:

What is disability? Is a person disabled because he is paralysed, blind or deaf? A more correct term to use in explaining these conditions is impairment – physical impairment or mobility impairment, visual impairment, hearing and speech impairment.

Being impaired in those ways do no necessarily make one a disabled person.

Lets look at the need of a wheelchair user. If there are buildings that wheelchair users can get into conveniently; if there are toilets that are accessible – large enough to accommodate wheelchairs; if there is public transport that wheelchair users can use.

If these conditions are fulfilled, the wheelchair user is no longer disabled.

Disability is not about us. Disability is not about us being physically paralysed, blind, deaf or learning impaired.

Disability is about society that creates barriers that disable us. Disability is about society with attitudes that disable us.

Society views us as people with extra needs that create problems that require extra cost and effort to resolve when in actual fact society is not doing enough to fulfil these needs to empower us – disabled persons – as a citizen and part of society.

We all have experienced oppression in one way or another, or in many ways. We have learnt about self oppression, familial oppression and societal oppression.

With the understanding that we are disabled through no fault of our own, we should find ways to communicate this to society that we can lead an equally fulfilling life just like anybody else given the opportunity.