Disability Awareness and Inclusion: 5 Ways to See Life Differently

1 in 4 adults in the United States has a disability. Globally, it's approximately 1.3 billion people. Disability is one aspect of identity that every single person at some point in their life will experience. whether temporarily or permanently. I'm Zaakirah Muhammad, a childhood eye cancer survivor, TEDx speaker, storyteller, and a disability advocate. Being diagnosed with retinoblastoma at the age of 9 months old, I have been seeing life through a different lens, literally, since then. I have a prosthetic eye in my right eye, which is as a result of the surgery to remove the tumor from my right eye. And as a result of the radiation treatment, I lost my hearing. So I wear hearing aids. And I am going to talk about the fact that disability can affect all of us. It's a human experience and how we can be more inclusive and empathetic. And with a few ways for you to also advocate. So I grew up in a world where accessibility was not necessarily designed with us in mind. Gratefully, I had advocates for myself growing up in school. I had what they call individualized education plans, or IEPs, which resulted in me also having speech therapy. I was not always this confident speaker. I had to have speech therapists to guide me, and beautifully enough, that speech therapist was not only helping me to speak confidently, but also just helped me to overcome the adversity, the mental trauma that can be isolating when you have to continuously advocate for yourself over and over again to make sure that you're safe, to make sure you have access, to make sure that you can be confident and thrive. So I went from having classrooms that didn't support me to having parents and advocates that understood how to best support me, such as making sure that I was upfront and personal with my teachers, sitting up front to make sure that I can lip read and understand them. And at one point technology changes all the time, so I would have a speaker system that— but not only am I listening to make sure that I hear everything that the teacher's saying, but so can my peers. I also then would make sure that I have homework assignments, make sure everything's written down, and maybe I also get access to the teacher's plans ahead of time so that I know what to expect. But throughout that experience, I learned that disability isn't a problem, humanity is. And again, this, this isn't a call out, it's just bringing awareness to the things that still need to be changed. Beautifully, technology is changing and we have captions. I heavily depend on captions in order to make sure that I understand what's being said. And now you heavily depend on captions in order to watch your videos on mute. Same thing for when it comes to making sure that There's flashing lights on your phone. That also helps those who are hearing impaired, cannot hear that well, to be able to know that there's a notification coming on their device in their hotel room. But sometimes you use it because you don't want to talk to people, right? You want to keep everything on silent. But again, this goes to making sure that we're being more empathetic to even those who have mental differences as well. So One of the things that most people don't seem to do is ask. They don't even ask for help. Ask us, how can we support someone who's disabled? So sometimes we have to be the one who seems like we're saying the same thing over and over and over again and maybe seem like the annoying client or the annoying conference attendee because we want to make sure that, are you going to accommodate my needs because I'm telling you what I need? Of course, then at the other end of the spectrum, where somebody's newly disabled and doesn't even know how to articulate what they need because they know that they're going to be judged, chastised, belittled, the whole bit. But as long as someone continues to listen and authentically listen, the validation makes all the difference in the world. It makes a huge difference when I attend events and I know that I am accommodated for. I don't have to keep following up on Are there any captions, or can you send me the schedule? Is there going to be an interpreter? I love to know that everything is set and ready to go. I have over 10 years of experience as a brand strategist. My background was in photography. Even after discovering that it was a photograph that detected my type of cancer, I then became a photographer. I was the little historian for the family. I was The one who learned how to take pictures professionally in my technical program and beyond. And then I'm taking pictures at events. So even though I'm used to being behind the scenes, then there was a shift in my career where everyone was adapting to smartphone photography. So then I'm learning how to teach people how to use social media. And so that really was also the introduction of Zoom. Zoom did not always have captions that are always there. We had to make sure that captions are enabled. So it takes a lot of people continuing to advocate in order to understand why you're using certain social media tools. So I think it really starts with making sure that you normalize the things that are being used. It's not just ramps or wide enough rooms, but also making sure that there's sensitivity in languages as well. Sensitivity in the way that people think. Sensitivity in the way that people retain information. And also, unfortunately, there's still a lot of gaslighting happening. And it's very important to believe people the first time when they tell you what they need, when they tell you what's going on. So I have been making sure that people understand why you see life differently. Because everyone is really different. Disability is not one single thing. And it's not limited to any gender or race or ethnicity. And even with my own experience of growing up being not disabled enough, because invisible disability is an additional complication to it. The systems want to prove it, your jobs and the HRs want to prove it. But sometimes we just omit it on purpose because we're tired of the judgment. Sometimes they will see us just participating like regular, being functioning, hosting events, speaking on TEDx stages. But what goes behind the scenes is how long it takes to recover from those topic events. And it can be a slower recovery period if we have the tools that help us to thrive and work in our own zone of genius as well. So the good thing about me having a different lens, seeing only when I had resolved a retinoblastoma, after I've overcome the survivor guilt of being one of the few who survived, at least in my time period in the '90s, then I was able to then have that unique experience. I've been able to go to over a dozen countries and over 5, 4 or 5 continents. And because of those experiences, but also because going back to the fact that I had somebody else to advocate for me first and foremost, I can then walk through that door or that airport gate, if you will, with confidence knowing that, okay, I will be okay. 9 out of 10 times, people do not even travel internationally because of those fears of Not being able to hear in a different environment, not being able to see very well. But as long as someone else is being able to advocate for us, it makes it a lot easier for us to advocate for ourselves. So I say all that to say, make sure that you're asking what people need, or continue to do social listening and research, because a lot more people are speaking up and talking about it. So listen, do social listening. Normalize disability. Do not make it a, we'll get back to it, you know, if there's time, if there's a budget. Expand your idea of accessibility and understand that captions are very helpful for everyone. Why people need slides ahead of time. Why other people prefer certain lighting environments. And believe people the first time. If they are— if you are curious about their diagnosis and they're comfortable with telling you, let's put away the victim— the victimizing of— let's stop saying I'm sorry, right? Let's try to unite and just stop— let's stop saying sorry and just start doing something about it. So, if this resonated with you and you want to continue to learn more, you can watch the TEDx talk called Seeing Life from a Different Lens. This is where I was able to talk more about, I was able to talk more about what it's like traveling with a disability, what it was like being an entrepreneur and choosing entrepreneurship on purpose. And also, it's an extension of the book. So if you are in a gift-giving guide, gift-giving mood, you can be sure to gift the guide. It's a memoir. My mom and I wrote it together. But it's also a guide. We talk about advocacy. We talk about disability awareness. We talk about traveling and sometimes what it's been like to be the only person in a room sometimes. And then last but not least, if you are still curious as to who is Zaakirah, who am I, and how can I continue to be that consultant for you when it comes to disability events, travels, and you also, or you want to confidently tell your own story and speak on international stages as well, be sure to go to my Linktree and connect with me there. And thank you for watching, and I will see you next time. Bye.