I received a phone call the other day from my 86-year-old mother, who lives in a small apartment in Queens, New York. Her knees have been failing her for years and she is now at that proverbial 'fork in the road' where she has to decide between having surgery and using a scooter or wheelchair to get around her environment. She is a poor candidate for surgery because her motivation to rehabilitate herself, which requires a great deal of commitment and determination, is low. Transitioning from a cane to a wheelchair is the most logical thing to do, but living most of her life in a pre-ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) era where disability was considered an embarrassment has prevented her from making the transition to using an assistive device. The generation in which my mother spent most of her adult years perceives a wheelchair as a negative thing rather than as a tool for maintaining freedom and independence.

Read the entire column at: http://www.ncpad.org/476/2363/2007-7~Issue~~Inaccessibility~of~the~Built~Environment~Hits~
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