AILSA'S "BRAIN ON WHEELS"

Written by Ailsa Speak

At Blogashopper, we believe in bringing out the finest of our guest speakers to inspire the world in acquiring noting but the very best for them. We now introduce Ailsa, who is the proud owner of Brains on Wheels, which is her personal blog discussing and sharing her experiences while living with Cerebral Palsy and how it adds value to her life on a daily basis, by spreading its the awareness.

I, Ailsa, live with Cerebral Palsy and wouldn't say that my disability is that severe because I can do a lot of things whereas there are people who are worse off than me. For example, one thing I can do and love doing is using my feet to utilize my computer! And that is exactly what I am doing now while typing this blog for you! What caused my #CerebralPalsy was the fact that I was a stillborn baby who did manage to survive but didn’t breathe until the doctors got me resuscitated after 20 minutes.

As far as I'm aware I was fine when I was in my mother’s womb, but when I came through the birth canal the doctors lost my #heartbeat, which is normal, but when I came out, I didn't breathe. At this point, the doctors didn't know whether I would live or not. Then they said I would live but they didn't know how long I would live for and what quality of life I would have. Finally, they said I would live a decent quality of life, like anyone else. So during that time when I didn’t breath, my brain didn’t get the oxygen it needed, resulting in a brain damage. I was on a ventilator for two days and had tubes all over me so that I could breath and #survive. On that day, there were about three stillborn babies, but I was the only one who survived. The doctors gradually turned my life support down so they could find out whether I would breathe on my own, and I did. I came off the ventilator on my sister's birthday, which was a wonderful birthday present for her!

My type of #CerebralPalsy is called Quadriplegic (affects all four limbs) Athetoid (uncontrollable movements) Cerebral Palsy and it effects every muscle in my body, apart from my heart, luckily. My right arm is affected more than my left, thus I can hardly use my right arm because my muscle tone is worse in that arm.  In other words, I have more involuntary movements and my right arm has become weaker over the years as maybe I didn't use it much when I was younger.

I aim to raise awareness about #disabilities because I feel that it is

an important subject for everyone to be aware of. I think so many people just dismiss me because they think they won't be able to understand me or the other way around. There is no doubt that other people feel the same way about this, so I want to help to put a stop to this. This is partly why I write on my blog, along with the fact that I love it! I feel like it is what my purpose in life is. I believe that too many people are afraid to talk about disabilities because they think that they might offend another person, or they might feel awkward talking about it. In my opinion, you have nothing to stop you talking about things and if other people don't like it, then it's their problem, not yours. Never be afraid to talk about disabilities or illnesses. If you don't talk about it, then it will be even more awkward as even though you will always be thinking about you, you won’t actually do much to change it or how the society views it. The society we live in believes in maintaining silence rather than discussing disabilities and #illnesses and as a result keep people away from learning more about them.

People often say that they "feel sorry" for me and that makes me feel unhappy and awkward because I am who I am and I can't change that. I don't want anyone to pity or feel sorry for me just because I have Cerebral Palsy. If I didn't have C.P., I wouldn't be the person I am today and I wouldn't have met some of the awesome people I know! So, next time you think of feeling sorry for me, please don't as I am very lucky to be here today! I do need help to do some things but otherwise I am as #independent as possible.

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