If you had told me last month that I would be considering asking my doctor to sign off on a handicap parking permit I would have laughed at you, but lately I have found myself really thinking hard about it. I certainly don't need it all of the time, there are days when I can walk and be just fine and then there are the days when I am in so much pain that just walking 10 feet to the bathroom seems like a gigantic undertaking. Those are the times I need I would use it.....but I struggle, the internal struggle is real. I think about all of the people who are far worse off than I am, who literally cannot breathe well enough on their own to walk from a regular space, or those who are in wheelchairs? Certainly I should suck up my own pain and hobble a bit further, right? I mean it just hurts, it isn't like it is going to kill me or cause a medical emergency if I have to walk farther, right? But then there are those cases such as going to the beach, I know, you are thinking , if you are in that much pain why are you trying to go to the beach, right? Well many of you know that sometimes you try to be normal even when it is evident that you aren't, sometimes you do it for your kids and family and sometimes you just get plain tired of RA taking things from you so you give it the finger and go despite the pain. But the beach....yes.....15 minutes of walking from the closest parking spot you can find until you have any hope of finding a place to sit and rest. Then I could see using it....I don't know, maybe it is all of my years in the medical field that has made me stubborn to my own detriment....I just don't know.
Then there is the fear and aggravation of the inevitable confrontation when someone (with the best of intentions) rips me a new one for parking in a handicap spot that I obviously don't need since of course I don't look disabled and I'm only in my 30s....not sure if I want to open myself up to that. It's not that I care what people think, I just don't know if I want to deal with one more aggravation.
How about all of you? Do you have a handicap parking permit? What made you decide to finally get one?
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