In the history of our disability rights movement, there have been many lives who changed our lives through the lessons of their personal story, and the power of their advocacy. The non-disabled world knows little to nothing about the unsung heroes of our movement, the ones to whom we owe our healthcare rights, our parental rights, […]
About Maria Palacios
The year Santa was in a wheelchair
I’ve always known the magic of kids–the magic they bring to Christmas. It’s not the other way around like many people think. Christmas would have no magic without the innocence of kids whose joy brings hope and forgiveness to a, sometimes, hopeless and unforgiving world. Kids do that because childhood is that kind of time […]
How things change: Reflections from a disabled mom about the holidays
Everything was difficult for me as a disabled mom, and I say it that way now looking back as I marvel at how I survived raising kids in a nondisabled world before access to technology afforded us some of the small luxuries we enjoy now, and before disabled moms were as visible as they seem […]
Ableism and Parenting
Ableism is real. Ableism is painful. Yet, for many of us disabled people, it can be difficult to paint the picture of what ableism looks like, or how it affects our lives, and, as disabled parents, how it affects our children and the way THEY see us. Going through some old photos I came across several […]
A Normal Life
They cried when I went back to work. They cried, and begged me not to go —begged me to stay with them like I’d done for so long. And although I might have appeared tough when I told them not to cry, my heart was already broken when I kissed them goodbye, and boarded the […]
Your Mama’s In A Wheelchair
You came home crying one day because a boy at school insulted you —said something “bad” about your mama. Tears of anger and hurt rolled down your little boy face when you explained the boy had said that your mama’s in a wheelchair, and you punched him for saying that, I guess, because in your […]
First Day of School
It was your first day of school, and I remember being more nervous than you, and trying to hold back the tears, tears I think most moms experience when their babies go to school for the first time. But for me, that time, my tears also came from fears rooted in my past — […]
The ADA and Disabled Motherhood
I became a mom in the early days of the ADA, back when just the idea of disabled women becoming mothers was revolutionary. And it’s not that disabled mothers or disabled parents did not exist. Disabled parents have always existed, but have done so behind the scenes of other people’s lives because being fully in charge […]
Hide & Seek
I laugh quietly as I remember the time when I hid you in a basket full of clean laundry while playing hide and seek with you and a group of other kids. It was your turn to hide and I always tried to find the most ingenuous hiding spots that kept kids searching and searching, […]
Envy
I used to envy the moms who seemed to have it together -the ones who made it look easy and whose lives afforded them luxuries like driving their kids to school, or the big house with a pool and a big yard- things for which I worked hard but never reached no matter how others […]