Discrimination base on disability -a reprint

I call myself a visionary, my idea of personal success was based on the things I learned as a youth in church and read along with my family however when I voice these goals the reaction I get is absolute silence -is that silence I wonder from shock? Dismay that this disable child and later woman dare to dream big or just plan judgmental based on disability?
Well I was born in the late 60's with three incomplete limbs and one fully formed hand so based on reaction from relatives and family friends not much was expected from me. "Ahh if she doesn't die before age five well she will just be a burden but is we own so we gaffa try wid she". This was the common tone of referral to me, "hey I wanted to shout I ain't gat much limbs but I'm not deaf. I could hear your dismal pronunciation on my life"

But thankfully I am from a family that love to read and I was a sponge, before I was age 11 I'd read books by Norman Vincent Peal, Herbert W Armstrong on the power of the mind and seven laws of success, I'd read Malcolm X and a series of books on the power of affirmation by Charles Fillmore from Silent Unity. These were the ones that stood out.

I began strategizing for my life, advocating to my mother and using arguments to swing her thoughts and attitude from the negative to positive. I was campaigning for my life! Well I did a reasonable job. For after attending special school and learning kinder garden work for the first eight years of my life and being bored. I manage to finally cross over and enter mainstream school at age 13. I just wanted the foot in. There began the route to my academic goals.
25 years later I have a degree and am about to pursue a masters, I have 15 years working experience in teaching in mainstream school, working in clerical and accounting projects and currently manages projects. All this I did wearing prosthesis and sometimes from a wheelchair. Same mostly limbless child turned mostly limbless women has began to achieve my vision of academic and professional successes.
In this journey I battled abuse - both psychological and physical. My parental team have all died and I live one paycheck away from poverty. I live in a developing country where real enabling services for disabled people are still absent.
My secret to achievement lie in focusing on my vision irrespective of what others predicted or whether they fail to support or encourage me. It lies in my belief in my creator that he brought me here for a purpose and its evolving. It lies in actively seeking opportunities and building allies, it lies in letting go of some of allies and in reconnecting with others after a while. It lies in my willingness to go it alone when all others around me fail to visualize a successful future for me.

I endured depression, low blood pressure, financial and housing woes, lost of assets and opportunities, high cost of accessing a pair of prosthesis. Yet through it all my strong faith and my tireless pursuit of a life of independence has continues and is ongoing.
My next goal is to in partnership with my disable peers and other stake holders build hotel access and an employment integrative village in my country Guyana to minimize the struggles of persons with disabilities who could live independently but are being forced to accept charity and welfare because of the attitude prevalent in society of “low expectations for persons based on disability.
(first appeared on disboom.com)