Disability Horizons

Listen Confidence isn’t easy to come by, so it gives us solace to hear how one reader came to realize that beauty is on the inside and acceptance and believing in yourself are key to gaining confidence. I have just returned from a staff party, which was my first social event with my new electric wheelchair [...]

Listen New Disability Horizons contributor, Dale Lehn, shares his story of how an unexpected disability encouraged him to create an ingenious product for disabled people: My4Hands. Back in 2001 I was happily living with my family in the suburbs of Baltimore, Maryland with a successful sales management career in information technology. We were returning home [...]

Listen New Disability Horizons contributor, Freddie Sheffield, 14, tells us about his trip of a lifetime in Whistler, Vancouver, where, for the first time, he experienced adaptive skiing. During the Easter holiday, in 2007, my family and I went on a trip that we will never forget. We wanted to try out something very different [...]

Listen Delivering presentations is becoming a greater aspect of many employment roles and interview processes. As someone with a mobility impairment, I often wondered if there was anything I could do to assist and improve my ability to present. On occasions, I’ve felt very self-conscious of my disability and my ability to project myself, which [...]

Listen John Pring, who runs the Disability News Service, publishes his weekly news round-up of the happenings in the disability world the past week. • Leading figures in the disability movement say they could stop cooperating with the Department for Work and Pensions if the government’s welfare reform bill becomes law. • The London 2012 organising committee’s [...]

Listen Anne-Wafula Strike was born in Mihu, Kenya, and became disabled after suffering with polio at age two. After a childhood dealing with personal tragedy and having to fight against prejudice, Anne-Wafula has found success in athletics. She was the first wheelchair athlete from East Africa to compete at the Paralympics in Athens in 2004, [...]

Listen New Disability Horizons contributor, Hine Moke, tells us how the earthquakes in Christchurch, New Zealand, affected the accessibility of a city ravaged by natural disaster. 22nd February 12:51pm is a date and time I shall never forget! My peaceful city, Christchurch, New Zealand, was broken beyond my wildest dreams during a series of earthquakes. 9 [...]

Listen Regular Disability Horizons contributor, Sarah Ismail, discovers the parallels between her personal experiences of living with cerebral palsy, and that of the author of “Off Balanced”. Off Balanced is the teenage memoir of Zachary Fenell, a young American man with mild cerebral palsy. This electronic book takes us through the teenage years of a [...]

Listen Regular DH contributor, Mark Wilson, who worked for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) for over 35 years shares an article about the usefulness of pre-recruitment courses for disabled jobseekers. We are living through hard times. You may have read that, heard it debated on endless news programmes and, let’s face it, since [...]

Listen John Pring, who runs the Disability News Service, publishes his weekly news round-up of the happenings in the disability world the past week. • Opposition and independent peers have secured three key victories over the government in the battle to reverse its planned cuts to out-of-work disability benefits. • A new report has revealed “serious inaccuracies” [...]