Shades of grey

I realize now that I used to view the world as either black or white. Things were either right or wrong, and good or bad. This program has drilled into me that for a lot of things 'it depends' is often the answer. At the beginning this really frustrated me since I wanted to have a concrete answer but I realized that life is a little more complicated and often there is no real 'right' answer and no 'right/wrong' treatment.

I have also realized that I often judged people before really getting to know them and often labelled them as either good or bad when in reality people are different and are human and everyone has good aspects and bad aspects to their personality that is what makes us human if everyone was perfect we wouldn't be human and would be more like the stepford wives. The thing is in any interaction it takes two to tango and therefore I could be viewed as the 'bad' person by them and in reality personalities clash and sometimes 2 people with different personalities just don't get along and it doesn't mean that one person is 'good' or 'bad'.

Disability can also be subjectively viewed as shades of grey. I used to feel sorry and feel sympathy for being that are 'disabled' but I've realized that a disability can mean many different things and as a future PT I can't really help my clients if I feel sorry for their situation. Everyone has their own issues and we all could in some way be labelled as 'disabled' there is no such thing as a normal person. I myself get very anxious in large crowds, have trouble interacting with others, am sensitive to noise as well as having mild asthma, does that mean I'm disabled? Is the person with the peanut/gluten/milk allergy disabled? Is the person with an knee ACL tear, or torn meniscus that can't ski anymore disabled?

Everyone has their own problems and what distinguishes people is how they deal with those problems. Do they accept them and learn to live with them? Or do they become depressed and wallow in self pity? 2 people with the same can have 2 different ways of leading their life and ultimately how they do it is up to them.

My role is to help them achieve as much independence as they can and then to recommend devices or methods to compensate for things they cannot do. This can mean using a cane, walker, wheelchair for safety/balance/mobility or learning to compensate with a stronger side after a stroke and retraining to their good side to do things they did with both sides before such as eating with one hand or transfering with one hand.

In the end life is full of challenges and it is not the challenges that define who we are but how we deal with those challenges.