How to Accept You Have a Disability

One of the hardest parts of having a disability is accepting you have a disability.

Feelings of shame, the stigma attached to illness, and the expectations of those around you can make having a disability feel like an impossible thing to navigate.

It may make you feel like less of a person or may make you feel useless and unworthy. It may make you feel like you are burden to others. It may feel like it takes away some of your independence and the ability to take care of yourself.

Whatever harsh or negative things disability makes you feel should be validated and empathized with, but it’s at this point, that you can learn to acknowledge your disability and begin to accept and learn how to live with it.

It’s entirely possible to overcome the challenges of your disability and live a fulfilling and happy life.

Mourn the loss of what you were or what you thought you once were

Let your emotions and feelings flow. Don’t try to suppress or hold back any of the things you are feeling or experiencing in the moment. Bring your emotions and feelings and fears to the surface so you can fully face them.

Accepting a disability also means accepting the loss of something you once had or thought you had. This takes time to come to terms with and there is a grieving process that should be respected with your acceptance.

If you have a trusted therapist or friend, share your feelings and experience with them. If you don’t have anyone to share your experience with, try writing down what you’re going through in a journal. You can also turn to online support groups to find others that may be experiencing the same things as you and can offer a supportive listening ear.

You will have good days and you will have bad days - accept where you are

Coming to terms with your disability comes with a lot of learning and introduction to things you might not know or may have not experienced before. This, on its own, can be very overwhelming.

Not every day will be easy. Let yourself have bad days without seeing it as a negative reflection of yourself. Know that you will need time and patience to learn about and accept what your life new life may look like.

It all takes time. Let your good days fill you with hope and use that hope to get through your bad days.

On exceptionally bad days, try finding others like you who have succeeded in doing what you are trying to do. Read uplifting stories from those who have been in the same situation and found a way to make it through.

You will make it through this.

Accept help and supports

Having a disability usually entails having to learn how to live differently than you may have been used to.

In the mental health world, this can look like many different things.

It probably has now become essential to not skip things like self-care and to have ready made plans or routines to help you live your life successfully. You may realize that in order to live your life successfully, you will need to change a lot of things that you currently do, as they don’t support your new life with a disability.

In terms of help from friends and family, let them be there for you initially! Accept the help and support that others around you are willing to give you during this time of need.

Use the help and support you receive to help you find better solutions for the long term.

Find out if there are any supports you can receive from your community. Your disability may entitle you to certain supports from the community like a service coordinator or other type of support person who can assist you in getting back on your feet and help you transition into living life with a disability.

Utilize online communities to find out what others in your situation have done to help make their lives easier and simpler.

There is nothing wrong with or shameful about accepting help. Accepting help and supports can be what gets you on the path to living an easier and healthier life.

Become an expert on your diagnosis and disability

To accept and embrace your diagnosis or disability also means coming to terms with and understanding your diagnosis or disability. Knowledge is power.

Educate yourself as much as possible on your diagnosis or disability so you can become the best advocate for yourself. Learn to understand what your diagnosis means. Become knowledgable about the medications you can take and how they work. Become aware of the experience of others who have your diagnosis. Become an expert in learning how to manage and live with your illness.

Sometimes, if we already know our diagnosis, we may feel like we already know everything there is to know. But living with a disability, compared to just having a diagnosis, can be two very different things.

Research more into the disability side of what your experience might be like and get an understanding of how disability differs from just having a diagnosis. Your life experience, your needs, and what supports you can obtain may be completely different now that your illness has become disabling.

Set realistic goals and be patient

Having limitations doesn’t make you any less of a person and it doesn’t take away your ability to be a useful member of the community. Rather, it means learning to adapt, learning to work around your limitations so you can still accomplish the things you wish to accomplish.

Start by setting small, realistic goals for yourself to accomplish. This will help you begin to build confidence and motivation around goal setting.

Remember to set goals in a healthy frame of mind, ex: Instead of framing a goal as “stop eating junk food every night”, change it up and reframe it to look like “eating healthy 4x a week.”

Another big part of setting realistic goals is to BE PATIENT.

This may be the hardest part of goal-setting. Have easy ways to track your progress so you can quickly and easily see the different ways you have been progressing. This will make it much easier to be patient and stick to your goals or plans long-term.

If you want to deep dive into goal setting, check out my article:

A Guide for Self-Organization: Goal Setting 

To summarize, having a disability does not make you a useless part of society or make you any less than other human beings. By investing in yourself, you can take back your sense of life and autonomy. In fact, many find out they can do more than they ever thought they could do.

If you have any other suggestions for accepting and coming to terms with your disability, please share below!