Just Like You

I want to thank you all for taking the time to read my blog entries. I know my last blog entry titled “Nothing is Forever” was not the most pleasent blog entry to read, it certainly wasn't the most pleasent to write either. Went I was writing my last three blog entries I had the mentality while writing the entries to show you what I went through; and even more so, to show you that we, people with Cerebral Palsy function just like you. My next blog entry will be called “Just Like You”.

Although there are some cases where a person with cerebral palsy who are mentally retarded, but most of us are mentally functionable. Those who have spastic cerebral palsy, for example, can be misinterpreted as having a cognitive delay due to difficulty of communication when in fact we are very smart, very prrceptive, and very sentitive. I speak primarily from my own experience.

For one reason or another parents, even though they know the kid is highly intellagent and bright, they still become naïve and resort to shelter their kids out of fear. Whether it's fear of them getting their feelings hurt or something underlying, it still happen a lot. Some don't realize that if they shelter too much kids with cerebral palsy likely become content and too acceptting as I talked about in my privious blog entry titled “Acceptance”. Fortunately, my mom did her best not to be sheltering; however, she did be a little sheltering when I started junior college because she was concerned that it would be too much for me. Well, here I am holding a BA in Pyshology.

Some who know people with cerebral palsy, especially those who can't talk very well or can't talk at all, know that they are very perceptive. Now, how can this magically happen? Well, drawing on my own experience and on my educated guessing we were forced to. Not perposely, but naturally. To me, the more one doesn't talk the more percerive one is. It make sense in a lot of cases. However, when we talk a lot we tend to loose touch of what is going on around us. Coincidently, I did not start making verbal sounds until I was two years old and I am often discribed as being extremely perceoptive. What we are unable to use well we naturally draw on our inter resources.

I consider myself very fortunate to have had the chance to experience what so many of you litterally take for granted. We are sentitive just like you. We go through ups and downs. We go through happiness and heartbreaks. We are given a chance and we are rejected. We go through every single emotions there is, sometime more so then others. We fall and we pick ourselves up with support or we do it by ourselves. We are just like you.