Four Common Misconceptions About Living With A Disability

What is the toughest part about having a disability? While adapting to everyday life, struggling with mental and physical challenges, and successfully living a pain-free life are tough, many disabled Americans struggle most with the stigma surrounding being disabled.

How can we help remove this stigma? It begins with dispelling common myths about what it feels like to be disabled, and what disabled people are like. Let’s start with these four common misconceptions:

• Disabled people should be pitied. Disabled people may need your help when it comes to opening a door, getting around, or navigating the world. They may also need help in the form of Social Security benefits and medical services. But they don’t need your pity. Many are very happy, capable, and proud of how they have dealt with their mental or physical condition.
• Disabled people can’t work. It’s true that some disabled people aren’t able to join the workforce. It’s also true that some can’t continue the career they had before their disability. But it is totally false that all disabled people don’t earn a living or don’t learn a new skill or trade after their disability.
• Disabled people are a drain on the system. This is simply not true. Anyone who receives Social Security benefits has worked for those benefits and has “bought in” to the system in the years before their disability. In addition, many disabled people work hard, help others, and have unique offerings, skills, and wisdom to share with the world.
• Disabled people are different that you and me. Yes, some disabled people look different than most and some act different than most. Others have different needs and abilities than the average Americans. But, in the end, they are no more different and no more similar than any two people. We should celebrate both our differences and our similarities. 

Do you need the assistance of a Social Security disability lawyer who has a great understanding of what it is like to live with a mental or physical disability? Contact the Dallas Social Security Disability attorneys at Morgan Weisbrod today at 800.800.6353.

by Paul B. Burkhalter
Managing Partner of Morgan Weisbrod , Board Certified in Social Security Disability Law.

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