Like all of us, Katie has a unique perspective. But hers might be unfamiliar to you. Read on …
Having a mobility impairment is hard anywhere. The hills and public transit system unique to San Francisco add further complication for those of us with broken bodies. I’m missing half of my right foot because of a motorcycle wreck. I have a skin graft, nerve damage, and phantom pains in tissue that don’t exist anymore.
I ride Muni every day. It’s important I get a seat–if I stand all the way from Taraval at Sunset to Van Ness, the rest of my day is ruined. 20 minutes of balancing on a mangled foot causes anywhere from 12 to 72 hours of pain. I use my cane every morning. When I can grab a seat, sitting in the handicapped seating is stressful.
I get on the train in the Sunset/Parkside district and ride it all the way in. My disability is largely invisible unless I’m barefoot or wearing a skirt that exposes my scar-covered right leg. I get dirty looks from older riders when I don’t get up to allow them a seat; I look like a perfectly healthy 22-year-old woman. I sit in the seat, repeat to myself “you’re handicapped and have a right to sit here” and stare at my foot-and-a-half while clutching my cane with white knuckles.
If someone asks, I explain that I am handicapped; that usually kills any discussion. Only once has someone decided to inflict themselves on me and made me “prove” my disability. After taking off my shoe and asking that my medical privacy be respected, the rider in question turned beet red and got off at the next stop.
Monday morning, I wasn’t able to get a seat. I spent the entire train ride being flung around by inertia. I fell into the person to my left three times. She yelled “Bitch” at me, then turned to look at me and saw my cane. She then muttered “oh, sorry” and moved 2 inches to the right.
I tipped into the able-bodied young man who was in the handicapped seating. He looked up at me, saw the cane in my hand, made eye contact with me and shrugged, then turned up his headphones and pulled his hood over his eyes.
Six hours after my train ride that morning, my entire body was still in searing pain. I had to hold on with my right arm only, as my left arm has tendinitis in the wrist and elbow in addition to being the hand I hold my cane in. My right ankle, calf, knee, hip, shoulder, upper back, and neck were all in various levels of pain and swelling due to not being able to sit that morning. Any pain medications strong enough to combat the pain and swelling caused by the morning’s ride were so strong that I was too strung out to work.
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