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First, a visual description
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I'm a petite white woman in my mid-twenties with medium-length brown hair, and I'm holding
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a fabulous bedazzled white cane that's sparkly silver with a rainbow bottom
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As a teenage girl with a disability, I struggled desperately with self-esteem and self-worth
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It's never easy being 13, but I'd on to it being the only blind kid at my school, and
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I didn't know how to be okay with who I was. Fortunately, research shows that physical activity, especially school-based physical
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activity, can positively impact self-esteem and self-worth, and I happened to be enrolled
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in physical education class. Instead, after I was hit twice in the face with soccer balls, my teacher warned me that
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if it happened again, I'd have to sit out the rest of the year
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That was the end of my relationship with movement. I believed my education, that I couldn't do sports because I was blind, and I wasn't alone
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Eighty-one percent of disabled people do not feel welcome in fitness spaces
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The first time I met other disabled people my age was in university
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I joined a campus disability advocacy group, and for the first time in my life, I belonged
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I also learned about adaptive fitness and parasports, methods of exercising and competing
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that are adapted to various disabilities. When legislation came up to the state congress proposing an adaptive sports league for disabled
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school children, I testified on its behalf and rallied grassroots support until it passed
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two years later. By the time I left college, I had discovered blind pride, disability justice, and advocacy
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but my relationship with movement had never recovered, and again, I wasn't alone
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Disabled British adults are twice as likely as their non-disabled peers to be sedentary
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In the US, over two-thirds of disabled Americans get to know or do little exercise
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This is a global crisis. I joined Unilever in 2020 as a marketer, and a year into the job, I heard that a brand
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team was interested in spotlighting the disability community, and it happened to be the world's
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largest deodorant brand. Depending on where you're from, you might know them as Rexona, Shure, Degree, or Shields
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I joined the team as a disability marketing consultant. I helped shape our strategy to ensure we were authentically serving the community, and I
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checked all our press releases to ensure we were using disability-affirming language
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We published a letter in the New York Times calling on the fitness industry to be more inclusive
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We developed an online web portal for hiring disabled trainers, created an online inclusion
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toolkit for gyms, and even held an adaptive spin class in the middle of Manhattan
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We reached over a billion people with this campaign and brought thousands to our educational
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webpage, teaching the world about adaptive fitness. And this campaign is what finally made me reflect on my movement habit, or rather, the
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lack thereof. I read about an adaptive climbing group and decided to give it a try
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I climb with a sighted guide who stands on the ground and gives me directions through
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a headset, and in this adaptive, supportive environment, I thrived. I climbed once a week, then twice a week
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I went to nationals and joined the US National Rock Climbing Team
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And six weeks ago, I was in Switzerland, competing in the world championships and placing second
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within my category. Access matters. It's the difference between an anxious kid avoiding PE and an international elite athlete
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And it hasn't stopped there for me. Six months ago, I got talked into trying to train for a triathlon
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Five weeks ago, I was at triathlon camp at the US Olympic and Paralympic Training Center
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And three weeks ago, I finished my first race at the USA Paratriathlon National Championships
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Education does not start and end with school. Each of us has the power to teach our communities about adaptive fitness
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You can be the one to bring the inclusion toolkit to your neighborhood gym and advocate
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for it. Be the one to join your local adaptive fitness group
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And if one doesn't exist, create it. Share the stories of disabled athletes, not out of shock at their ability, but to teach
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the next disabled teenager how others have moved before her. Movement is a fundamental right, and each of us has the power to unlock the potential
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of disabled children and adults around the world
