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New Mobility •

Making Peace with My Spinal Cord Injury

Outside the window the summer sky is impossibly blue and oblivious to my plight on this bed. Sorrow pierces my heart, and a sob catches in my throat. The skilled nursing facility is alive with staff rushing about hustling residents into showers, pushing med carts, tending to droning call bells and haunting cries. The surgeon’s voice echoes in my mind every moment: words like “permanent” and “complete.”


Closing my eyes, I see myself on my feet, in my work boots and harness on the iron. Longing
Rooted in Rights •

Very Unfair: The Nightmare of Institutionalization

Like so much in this dystopia, care is about money. And disability is most certainly expensive. The durable medical equipment, medication, personal care, transportation, home modifications—the shopping list goes on. And everything tagged “accessible” is marked way up. Until I became disabled myself, I didn’t understand the extent to which ableism permeates people’s lives, including our wallets.

These aren’t expenses that the average individual

Spinal Cord Injury Articles

The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Threats to Cut Government Programs Impact Americans with Spinal Cord Injury

Accessing the services and resources we need to live quality lives can be a challenge for those of us living with spinal cord injuries (SCI). Almost 30% of Americans with SCI depend on Medicaid and thousands more rely on the Administration for Community Living (ACL) which provides services to people with disabilities regardless of insurance status. Recent threats to these programs have Americans with spinal cord injuries worried about losing these critical services.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

The High Cost of Living with Spinal Cord Injury

Living with spinal cord injury is expensive. Whether or not health insurance picks up some of the medical tab, many Americans with SCI find themselves paying out of pocket for numerous goods and services necessary for quality of life: home modifications, accessible transportation, supplies, and homecare not covered by insurance. The average yearly health care and living expenses vary according to the severity of the injury, but all SCI survivors can expect a hit to the pocketbook.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

You’ve Heard of Neuralink, But Do You Know About Synchron?

Neuralink and its Telepathy device has captured public interest around brain-computer interfacing (BCI) technology for people with disabilities impacting motor function, like spinal cord injuries. Maybe not widely known though, is other companies in the space are actually further into the clinical journey. New York based Synchron has reported promising results on their own clinical trials for their BCI, Sentrode.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Adaptive Sports for Power Chair Users

For many people who sustain a spinal cord injury, it’s important to get involved in recreation again. While sports like wheelchair basketball and wheelchair rugby are pretty widely known, power wheelchair users have historically been afforded less opportunities to participate in team sports. But now even individuals with high level cervical injuries can participate in multiple sports developed over the last several years, from power soccer to adaptive tennis and golf.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

When Airlines Damage Wheelchairs

When you live with a mobility disability, your mobility aids become an extension of yourself. You’re dependent on them. Their maintenance and timely repair means your quality of life. Participating in life feels like taking a risk, when accessing services out in society jeopardizes that mobility equipment. If you’ve ever flown on an airplane as a wheelchair user, you may have experienced property damage firsthand.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Can You Lose Parental Rights After a Spinal Cord Injury?

When you sustain a spinal cord injury, depending on its level and severity, loss of motor function can significantly limit physical activities. When you experience injury causing disability as a parent, these limitations extend to parental tasks and duties that pose challenges post paralysis. Despite limitations, and society’s assumptions about them, thousands of parents with disabilities make it work.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Sports and Spinal Cord Injury: The Statistics

Recreational sports of all types pose risks to children and adults alike who engage in them. Spine injuries comprise approximately 15% of all sports injuries. Sports injuries aren’t always a result of contact sports. In 2022, the sports category that caused the most injuries was exercise equipment. Sports activities frequently associated with injuries are exercise, cycling and basketball and among kids, football, girl’s soccer and boy’s wrestling.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Know Your Rights: Accessibility Equity in Healthcare Facilities

Accessibility for people with mobility disabilities like spinal cord injury (SCI) has improved over the decades since the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed in 1990. But while businesses that serve the public readily comply with ADA regulations regarding provision of ramps for wheelchair access, that’s often where accommodations end – even in a medical facility.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Spinal Cord Injury Awareness Month: Paralysis Prevention

September is Spinal Cord Injury Awareness Month and that’s important both because the issues with accommodations and accessibility which we face need to be brought to the table, and because most spinal cord injuries (SCI) can be prevented. Awareness of the staggering statistics (18,000 new injuries per year in the US alone) and the risky behaviors that can result in these catastrophic injuries, may actually serve to prevent some of them.
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Treating Bladder Dysfunction in Spinal Cord Injury

When you sustain a spinal cord injury, the disruption of the body’s signals to the brain effects more than sensory and motor function. Most people with SCI will experience neurogenic bladder dysfunction. That just means the damage to the nervous system causes the bladder difficulty draining properly. The bladder may retain or leak urine instead. The level of SCI determines bladder dysfunction. Depending on your symptoms, there may be surgical procedures to help manage the neurogenic bladder. Peo...
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Spinal Cord Injury: The Numbers

Spinal cord injury affects millions of Americans and their families. For many of us, the disability affects every aspect of our lives. Out of the more than five million Americans living with paralysis, one in four are survivors of a spinal cord injury or disease. How many spinal cord injuries are survived each year? Who do they affect and why do they occur? Which injuries are more common? What are the odds of recovery and rehabilitation?
The Spinal Cord Injury Law Firm, PLLC •

Hands-Free Hobbies for Spinal Cord Injury Survivors

With my complete C3 quadriplegia diagnosis, at first I imagined myself sitting in a power wheelchair gazing at the wall for the rest of my life, or out the window, had I been placed near one. I really couldn’t muster motivation to live just to sit through life, hands immobile on my armrests.
Fortunately, that fantasy was far from the truth. Eight years now, and I can’t remember the last time I was bored enough to stare listlessly into space, remembering life instead of living it.
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Human Rights Articles

Go Humanity •

High Health Insurance Deductibles are a Struggle for Many

Every January 1st, millions of Americans experience the resetting of their health insurance deductible. They’ll have to pay it in full before receiving needed medical services.

For low income and working class people, the burden of paying hundreds or thousands of dollars out of pocket before insurance starts helping with medical costs each year can be devastating financially.

While a high deductible might mean low monthly health insurance rates, deductible prices can be overwhelming. Deductibl
Go Humanity •

Self-Care for Activists & Volunteers

When we’re in the thick of the fight, advocating for others, raising our voices for the voiceless, it’s possible to nearly forget ourselves and the needs we still have. The needs we are seeking to provide others with are indeed dire, but we can’t help others unless we help ourselves.

Taking care of ourselves looks like getting adequate sleep and remembering to eat throughout a long, hard day. It looks like knowing when to stop and recharge, and when to say no.

Self-care is no self-indulgence,
Go Humanity •

Outrageous Rent Increases Impact Americans

This winter I was suddenly the only member of my immediate family not facing the very real possibility of homelessness. I’m disabled, so Medicare and my Disability checks pay for a room at an assisted living group home. My disability checks don’t pay enough for me to afford rent on a home by myself.

My parents had been renting a house that belonged to a church, whose staff decided to rent the home out to the new pastor. They were faced with a sudden search for a rental and were forced to rent a
Go Humanity •

Participating in Humanist Communities Makes a Difference

Like many humanists I was raised religious. In the years that followed my apostasy, sometimes I missed the camaraderie and community: church potlucks, theatrical plays, holiday celebrations, and charitable volunteering and fundraising.

Studies show that community is important for pro-social behavior, volunteerism, health, happiness, and well-being.

Community connection can be complicated in today’s society, though, with the ubiquity of social media. Participating in communities in person can i
Go Humanity •

A Very Humanist New Year

In the wake of a tumultuous 2021, we are all looking toward 2022 with understandable trepidation. As humanists, we hope humankind will see a period of relief after the storm for families suffering through the pandemic with food insecurity and economic hardship.

We yearn for a year in which we see favorable outcomes of the social justice movements of 2021, and in which we see more efforts toward combating climate change to avoid the natural disasters we suffered through last year, too.

We want
Go Humanity •

Humanists on the Holidays – GO Humanity

As a humanist, how do you celebrate the holidays?

Thinking about it, I celebrate it pretty similarly to how most Christians do. I do the Christmas tree, the colorful lights, the gifts, carols, and communal meal. I leave out nativity scenes and songs; those religious elements are really just a fraction of the Christmas traditions after all.

I was raised religious and remember the rhetoric about “keeping Christ in Christmas” and being careful not to care more about Santa, Rudolph, Frosty, and pa
Go Humanity •

Humanists on the Holidays – GO Humanity

As a humanist, how do you celebrate the holidays?

Thinking about it, I celebrate it pretty similarly to how most Christians do. I do the Christmas tree, the colorful lights, the gifts, carols, and communal meal. I leave out nativity scenes and songs; those religious elements are really just a fraction of the Christmas traditions after all.

I was raised religious and remember the rhetoric about “keeping Christ in Christmas” and being careful not to care more about Santa, Rudolph, Frosty, and pa
Go Humanity •

People with disabilities face unique challenges on the holidays

As I face my seventh Christmas with quadriplegia, I’m saddened as always that the holidays just aren’t the same. It’s not my disability that makes them any different, just the ways society excludes me with this power chair on my butt and no money in the bank.

I often say this is a bipedal world and I’m just rolling in it. Physical inaccessibility is no joke, though. There’s a tangible barricade between my physical body and the places it wants to be, like home for the holidays. The barricade con
Go Humanity •

Ending Child Marriage in the U.S.

The U.S isn’t the first country that comes to mind when one considers married children, but New York and Rhode Island just became the mere fifth and sixth states to ban the practice outright. (Following New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania and Minnesota.)

The marriage age is set by each state and territory, either by statute or common law. An individual can marry without parental consent or other authorization upon reaching 18 years of age.

But in most states the consent of parents or legal guar
Go Humanity •

College Students Face Food Insecurity

Food insecurity among college students is more widespread than many Americans may assume. More than 1/3 of college students today experience insecurity with food and/or housing because of the rising cost of tuition and high cost of rent.

Food insecurity is defined as “a federal measure of a household’s ability to provide enough food for every person in the household to have an active, healthy life”.

36% of college students aren’t eating well enough to be living active and healthy lives.

Coll
Go Humanity •

How Food Waste and Rescue Affects the Climate Crisis

Wasting food is one of the significant ways we contribute to climate change.

While food production is responsible for as much as 40 percent of global emissions, the food that is produced and never consumed continues to bear responsibility beyond its production. Wasted food wastes the water and energy required to produce it. And wasted food generates methane and carbon dioxide in landfills.

The U.S. discards more food than any other country in the world: almost 40 million tons each year, and 30
Go Humanity •

Hurricane Season To Exacerbate Food Insecurity

June 1 marked the official start of hurricane season. When hurricanes hit they can demolish homes, devastate communities and displace people. In most cases electricity is cut, and keeping food fresh is impossible. Food insecurity is a significant dilemma that always emanates in the event of a disaster like a hurricane.

An estimated seven million individuals impacted by Hurricane Harvey in 2017 were considered to be food insecure.

Food insecurity is defined as “the state of being without reliab
Go Humanity •

Why Kids Need a Summer Without Hunger

Every day 13 million children in the U.S. aren’t sure where their next meal is coming from.

One in six kids don’t have enough to eat at least some of the time. While that number is significant, during summer months it’s even more alarming, nearly doubling as kids lose access to school lunch and breakfast programs.

Families rely on school lunch programs to help feed their kids.

For some children, school lunch is the only meal they get all day.

While the responsibility of feeding kids has fall
Go Humanity •

Food Insecurity Rising Rapidly: Who Is Being Affected?

Food insecurity the state of being without reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food to live an active, healthy lifestyle. It might mean that sometimes you have enough food and sometimes you have healthy food but rarely do you have enough healthy food.

Food insecurity is at the . After decades of progress food insecurity has risen rapidly on a global scale due to the Coronavirus pandemic. people worldwide faced acute food insecurity in 2020.

that 42 million Americ
Go Humanity •

Inmates Face Aftermath of Toxic Flood in Florida Jail

Little over a week ago in Florida, hundreds of people (some 315 homes) were evacuated after a leak at Piney Point wastewater reservoir near Tampa. A local jail was also threatened by flooding with toxic water, yet it was only partially evacuated.

Most of Manatee County Jail’s prisoners (700+) were crowded upstairs, left behind to face the phosphorus.

Officials said the jail was prepared if the plant was breached, but an filed by the ACLU Tuesday argued for the release or relocation of inmates,
Go Humanity •

People Without Housing Targeted by City Ordinance in Austin

Early voting on a city ordinance to sweep people without housing out of view is underway in Austin. A ban on public sleeping was lifted in 2019, but now Austin’s homelessness problem has become too visible for some. A May 1 vote will determine whether or not to criminalize being homeless again.

Hundreds of jurisdictions across the U.S. have criminalized homelessness, and the trend shows no signs of abating. Cities have made it illegal to block a sidewalk, stand on a roadway median, sleep on pub
Go Humanity •

People with Disabilities Struggle in the Wake of the Blizzard

They say natural disasters don’t discriminate but one would be hard pressed to investigate a hurricane, earthquake, or blizzard in which one particular demographic wasn’t disproportionately hit: the disabled community.

The freezing weather swept in on Valentine’s Day weekend and tore through multiple states. Widespread power outages and bursting pipes ensued, flooding homes and leaving residents in darkness, and without heat and running water. In the wake of the blizzard, it’s disabled Texans t

Subjective Content: Telling My Story

SPINALpedia •

From Institution to Independence

As I rolled my power wheelchair through the doorway to my first independent home in more than four years, a sea of emotions swept over me. Pride. I worked hard for this moment. I advocated for the home based services I needed in my community. I took on multiple part time remote jobs. I jumped through all the hoops to qualify for this low income accessible apartment. It wasn’t a nice house like I could have afforded a decade ago, as a tradeswoman. But it was my own space in this world.
New Mobility •

Making Peace with My Spinal Cord Injury

Outside the window the summer sky is impossibly blue and oblivious to my plight on this bed. Sorrow pierces my heart, and a sob catches in my throat. The skilled nursing facility is alive with staff rushing about hustling residents into showers, pushing med carts, tending to droning call bells and haunting cries. The surgeon’s voice echoes in my mind every moment: words like “permanent” and “complete.”


Closing my eyes, I see myself on my feet, in my work boots and harness on the iron. Longing
Rooted in Rights •

The Nightmare of Institutionalization

Like so much in this dystopia, care is about money. And disability is most certainly expensive. The durable medical equipment, medication, personal care, transportation, home modifications—the shopping list goes on. And everything tagged “accessible” is marked way up. Until I became disabled myself, I didn’t understand the extent to which ableism permeates people’s lives, including our wallets.

These aren’t expenses that the average individual
New Mobility •

Self-Worth, Shame & Spinal Cord Injury

I was raised with the example of a hard-working, blue-collar father, and I went into the trades at 21. As I welded my way up the West Coast, young daughter in tow, I adopted this perspective that over-working oneself to death was an admirable way to go. My self-worth felt determined by how much I was contributing and participating. This applied to both my then-career in commercial iron and my anticipated career as a writer.

I never imagined the former would be cut so brutally short. I sustained
Her View From Home •

When You Can't Hug: A Post-Disability Mother-Daughter Relationship

The kind of mother I was at 32 was a strong, single, independent, provider type. I was a tradeswoman. I had begun a career in structural steel at age 21, and it took me all up and down the West Coast.

My daughter got everything she wanted, except my time and patience.

We were emotionally estranged. I thought such was inevitable with the approach of adolescence, and I was more consumed with my own adventures, part-time partners, and destructive habits than I was with parenting and bonding.

The
Wheelchair Accessible Lifestyle •

A Tale of Two Assisted Living Homes

After six years of navigating complete C-4 quadriplegic life I found myself in need of moving into assisted living two years ago.

I didn’t do any research before moving into the first place with a vacancy. I was just glad they would accept me, with my high level of care. Many assisted living homes are basically retirement homes and many residents don’t need a lot of care.

I had been warned this place was ran by rather negligent management and sorely understaffed, but the contract said ‘24 hour
Christopher Reeves Foundation •

Discovering Self-Love and Accepting My Post-SCI Body

It is human nature to accept ourselves more readily when we see that other people accept us. I have experienced this need for validation since I was a new kid in elementary school. This need still eats at me, even when I appear to have it all together.

When society told me that I needed to be pretty, I listened. When the media told me I had to be thin, I ate less. When boys started noticing me, I thought that was what being a woman was all about.

I became an ironworker soon after I graduated f
New Mobility •

Sacrifice and Strength: A Mother and Daughter’s Journey Through SCI

Rebuilding a life following a high-level spinal cord injury is never easy. For Cassandra Brandt, a single mother, and her daughter Haley, America’s worsening caregiver crisis forced them into a situation that no family should have to face.

Cassandra: The summer my daughter and I were 13 and 32 our lives were swept out from under us, and we were left struggling to adjust to unimaginable change.

I was a single mom putting myself through university by night and opens in a new windowwelding by day
Wheelchair Accessible Lifestyle •

A Quadriplegics Dreams of a Life of Passion and Purpose

“It was a straight downhill roll to the highway, and if I timed it right and gained enough speed, surely I could collide with a speeding semi-truck.”

Five years after the car accident that left me a C4 complete quadriplegic, I was losing my “why” to live and experiencing fleeting ideas about “how” to end my life.

A caregiver would have actually to show up and get me out of bed first. That was no easy feat; a primary source of my soul-sucking depression was directly associated with being stuck
Ability360 | Phoenix, AZ •

Medicating with Marijuana

It’s just another day, but for me that means waking up in pain, anxious, and with my limp body flopping around the bed like a fish out of water. I take my morning medications; for me, this includes a few puffs off a slim, silver vape pen. Inhaling, I let it calm me.

I blow the sweet tasting cloud into the air. My stiff arms and legs reluctantly respond, becoming still and pliable enough for my paralyzed body to be dressed. My mind calms and the body follows.

Even though I just medicated with m
Ability360 | Phoenix, AZ •

Reversed Roles Parenting with Disability

It’s Saturday morning and Haley, my 15-year-old daughter, comes to my room. We talk softly as she gives me my morning meds and empties my catheter bag. She brushes my hair and applies my makeup. As she dresses me we discuss school and her boyfriend. My brother, Efrim joins us and transfers me to my powerchair.

Haley is my only child and I am her only parent. She was 13 when I became paralyzed from the shoulders down as a passenger in a rollover car-accident. Before then, she travelled around th
Ability360 | Phoenix, AZ •

360 Perspective: Moving On and Going Out

360 Perspective: Moving On and Going Out

On Mother’s Day, my best friend Heather and I returned to the street where we flipped her SUV exactly two years ago. I remember being suddenly incapable of moving and the medivac helicopter’s propellers chopping through the dark sky. I remember terror.

I crushed my C4 vertebrae, rendering me unable to move or feel my body from the shoulders down. Terrifying weeks in ICU and many more in a nursing home followed the neck surgery that had saved my life. I

Why I Write

While I enjoy crafting a sweet sentence, my passion for writing extends beyond the insatiable urge to see my words in print. I'm primarily concerned with advocating for the marginalized communities I belong to, such as those with spinal cord injury and disability, and individuals deconstructing from religious abuse. 

[S]he who has a "why" to live can bear almost any "how".

Nietzsche

How I Write

My "why" to write demanded I find a "how". While expensive accessible software exists I didn't want to wait for the funds. I still often use a mouth stylus to type, my wpm competitive as my technique improves.

Telling My Story