When disabled people ask you not to use the phrase “wheelchair-bound”, it’s not political correctness gone mad; it’s political correctness asking you not to contribute to the harmful stereotypes that still plague disabled people’s lives despite proving them wrong time & time again.

The term bound has a lot of implications. It implies that no wheelchair-user, the phrase we would like you to use please, can stand or walk at all. This then contributes to the accusations of faking a disability for benefits, because as we all know that is by far the most effective way of paying the bills. It also contributes to the notion that sudden, inexplicable miracles are a lot more common than you would reasonably believe.

Bound is a word that also implies a lack of freedom, that someone is imprisoned by a wheelchair, which is not true. This in turn causes a lot of physical & mental harm to individuals who become disabled.

When it was recommended that I would need a wheelchair eight years ago, I was adamant that I would only use it for very long trips. I stubbornly refused to use it at after school events & on shopping trips, for fear that I would become disabled. The truth was that I was already disabled. A wheelchair doesn’t disable you; dysfunctional body parts do, & you just might end up using a wheelchair should such a malfunction occur.

My stubbornness left me in horrendous pain & with unbearable fatigue. Then, thanks to Graded Exercise Therapy, my health plummeted & I was left with no choice but to use the wheelchair every time I left the house.

As I expected my life was transformed, but to my surprise it was changed for the better. Suddenly I had my life back. I had an education & friends & as the years passed, I would make my way to university, employment, & marriage. None of it would have been possible without my wheelchair.

There is a stigma that becoming more dependent on mobility aids is “giving in” to disability. This is not true, unless of course you count “giving in” as learning to face an inherently ableist society where your basic human rights are constantly overlooked or denied completely. This stigma makes people believe that mobility aids are a worst-case scenario, that using them is to show weakness, & that their lives will become worse if they use them.

Many of us seem to have that awkward relative who, despite being increasingly aware of their age (to put it politely), refuses to accept help or mobility aids. How many bones have been broken because of this? How many people have been trapped in their own homes because of this? How many people lose their friends because of this? The fact of the matter is that not using a mobility aid is far more likely to imprison & harm someone than using one is.

When writing this I must admit I did have one particular person in mind, although from discussions on social media I know that this is a very common problem. I don’t know if that person will read this, & if they do I may well end up in trouble for suggesting such heinous things, as it is a difficult topic to discuss. By using more inclusive terminology that better reflects the experience of using a wheelchair or other mobility aid, perhaps we can learn to have this difficult discussion, & improve the lives of millions of people across the globe.