Rachel Coleman

I’m a California Girl and California Girls don’t go to Disneyland on weekends or holidays. We go to Disneyland on overcast, slight chance of rain days, in the middle of the week.

My family moved from Southern California when I was 11 years old. I am not sure that I ever really became a Utah Girl, but that’s not really the point. Once in Utah, I was struck by my peers’ conversations about Disneyland. “How many times have you been?” They were one-upping each other on the bus. “Four times” or “five times” produced dropped jaws. I kept quiet. I shook my head. Oh, those poor theme-parkless kids. They’d never believe me, even if I could add up all of those trips and produce a number for them.

Now, I have Utah Girls of my own. And I get it. Disneyland is no longer a mid-week, skip school, stay for fireworks and drive home exhausted kind of thing. It is an event. It is a… dare I say it? A long weekend kind of event, now that we live in Utah. My cute girls have no idea of the personal rules I break for them. Taking on Disneyland on a weekend? Sheesh!

Nevertheless, we do these things as parents… we do them for our children.

But… I still have an unfair advantage over the rest of you who are investing hundreds of dollars on a weekend, where your kids had better have fun, they’d better like it, and they’d better behave because it costs a small fortune just to walk through the metal detectors and finally cross the threshold to the Happiest Place on Earth.

Yes, it’s true. I have an unfair Disneyland advantage… I have a child in a wheelchair.

Now, if you can’t hack this conversation, click away. I’m just telling it like it is.

It used to be that a wheelchair, in Disneyland, was akin to a free ticket. Not “free” free, but pretty close to it. This fancy wheelchair used to allow us to walk right up the exits of rides, wait a car or two and then ride away in complete bliss. Especially blissful when you realize how many other folks were left juggling tired children, backpacks, strollers, and $6 sodas for hours on end, often for one short spin on Dumbo.

Well, things have changed a bit at Disneyland. Each time they update a ride, they also manage to bring it up to code. California Adventure, for example is so stinking accessible, we get to wait in their wheelchair-width mazes just like everyone else. Don’t waste your time trying to get an accessibility pass in California Adventure, go to Disneyland for it.

When Lucy and I went to Disneyland, we went with our friends Emily and Millie. You might recognize Millie as the little cherub on the cover of Baby Signing Time.

I was already in California. Emily, Millie and Lucy flew in together and met me there. Lucy and Millie held hands throughout the entire flight!

They arrived and we immediately went to the poolside restaurant.

Lucy ordered jumbo shrimp cocktail, her favorite.

I was performing the following day, so they came along to watch.

Emily spotted Scott Baio, she said that she had always wished he could baby sit her… (“Charles in Charge” reference folks) Lucy, in the background, was unimpressed.

The booth located right behind our Signing Time spot was a company called Cade Christian. Here’s the funny thing. Each year that I have presented at the Baby Celebration Los Angeles, I have drawn a good sized crowd of Signing Time Families. This crowd (Yeah, you guys) stays after and creates a substantial line for over an hour, waiting to take a photo, get an autograph and buy products. And each year some of the neighboring vendors have complained about the big, long line of parents and children standing beside their booths. (I’m not kidding.)

So, this year. I gave the Cade Christian folks a heads-up of what was to come and they said, “Oh we heard about that, so we requested to be right near your booth. They thanked me for bringing so many families to the event. And then they hooked the little girlies up with hats and sent one for Leah as well. Then Em and I bought some for ourselves.

Next stop, In-N-Out, on our way to Anaheim.

We arrived at Disneyland and checked in at City Hall to get our “perma-handi-fastpass” <---- not what it's really called, just what it does. Now, if you have just a regular kid in a wheelchair, maybe a broken bone or something, you don’t get much priority. If you have a child in a wheelchair who might have a difficult time waiting in long lines you get a little upgrade. They gave us the Super-Duper-Upgrade <---- not what it's called, just what it does- when they realized that Emily and I not only had Lucy and her wheels, but that little Millie is deaf.

And we were off! We let Lucy lead the way. It was one of the few times I felt uninvested. If she wanted to ride "Dumbo" 35 times in the next 48 hours, so be it. This was about her. And by the way I stopped counting after we rode "Dumbo" 8 times.

So, here are some things I didn’t know before this Disney trip.

“It’s A Small World” has been updated, and I don’t just mean the inside. The boats are all new and they have a special, wheelchair ready boat! Lucy was the queen of the world. I also stopped counting once we had ridden “Small World” 8 times.

If you have a child with special needs and you need a place to handle toileting, go to the First Aid Station (behind the hand-dipped corndog cart and past the Carnation Baby Care Center) They have cots, where you can lie your child down to change them in a private room with a sink and a toilet. They also have cold drinking water for free. They are cold water pushers. You almost can’t escape without cold water coming with you. This was Mecca! You have no idea how much time I spend scouting inconspicuous locations to do a quick-change for my 9 year old.

In the very accessible California Adventure, the newest ride “Toy Story Midway Mania” has wide lanes, so we got to wait with everyone else, BUT they have one car that will accommodate a wheelchair. We didn’t use it the first time, because they asked if we could transfer. I said, “Yes,” because we can transfer, but seriously that was the worst experience ever! The cars make hard lefts and hard rights with no warning. You are supposed to be shooting, but it doesn’t go so well when you are hanging on to your child who cannot sit independently. It was physically exhausting and our score was terrible! When we unloaded I let the guys running the thing know that “Can you transfer?” was not an adequate pre-requisite. I suggested they ask, “Can your child sit unassisted?” I am sure they were enthralled to hear my quick explanation of trunk control and head control and how Lucy may have just sustained whiplash and how I may have thrown out my back trying to keep her from getting her bell rung on the side of the car.

But… then they offered their fancy-schmancy-wheelchair ready car and that was a blast! Lucy sat in her wheelchair in the car and they strapped her wheels down. To make up for the first ride, they let us go two more times without waiting. But I think that was because it was easier to just let us keep riding than to maneuver that fancy-schmancy thing on and off the track. Lucy could shoot her own gun by bopping a button on top or yanking on a cord. I totally crushed her score though.

The parades were great. Lucy is not of fan of anything in costume, especially bigger than life costumes. She even hates Hopkins at our Signing Time shows… Hopkins!

And of course we got to relive memories of the infamous submarine experience in Mexico, but this time with the promise of Nemo below. And this time I wasn’t worried.

For those who cannot maneuver through the tight spiral staircase, there is another option. There’s a room that shows a movie of what you see under water. We tried both and we all agreed that being in the sub was much more fun.

Lucy really wanted to see Ariel, so we stopped by the restaurant Ariel’s Grotto on the first day. We asked about reservations for dinner the following day and were told by the hostess that reservations were not necessary. But, when we arrived for dinner the following day, all of the seatings were filled! Lucy was bummed. I explained what we were told the day before and today’s hostess said, “Reservations are not necessary, but they are recommended.” If your kiddo is an Ariel fan, don’t make this same mistake. Make a reservation.

The moral of the story is 1 in 1000 kids are born with spina bifida- if you are lucky enough to get one, then you are also lucky enough to park in the front row at Costco, even during the holidays. You also get to ride Dumbo and Small World countless times without waiting!

If ever you get stuck going to Disneyland on a busy holiday weekend, Lucy and I are available for rent.

Remember last summer, I was in Mexico having nightmares about a promise I had made to Lucy.
(If you missed that, read: Strong Enough To Be Your Mom – Part 1)

Anyway, last summer in Mexico I found an advertisement for a glass bottom boat. I thought it would be perfect for Lucy, because she is not a fan of putting her face under water. She has dysarthria<--- which came along as a sidekick to cerebral palsy<--- which came as a sidekick to spina bifida (Thank you very much).
Because of her dysarthria, snorkeling does not work for Lucy. It is tough for her to get her body to either breathe through her mouth or her nose.

I asked Lucy if she would like to see the fish, but do it in a boat and not even get wet! She loved the idea. I called the company to make the reservation. I asked them about wheelchair accessibility there was none. A bus would pick us up and take us to the main location. We would board a speedboat and it would drive us out to a small submarine. Then we would transfer onto the sub go down a tight spiral staircase to our seats below!

No wheelchair. Not for any of it. We would be gone for at least 6 hours.

Could I do it? Could I carry all 40+ pounds of her? Could I carry her as I exited a boat, out in the ocean, and hopped over to a sub?

Was I strong enough to bring her to new experiences? Or because of my lack of physical strength was she literally “bound” to her wheelchair? Was I strong enough to show her the world beyond sidewalks and ramps? The worlds of dirt and gravel and sand and water and beauty? What would she think of me if I failed her? Worse yet… what would I think of myself?

My nightmares the night before included being dropped off with her in the desert, with nowhere to rest, nothing but sand, sand dunes and smooth rocky hills. After hours in the hot sun, moving her from piggy-backing to a side carry, to baby-in-arms hold, I frantically looked for anyone who might have a stroller. Even in the deep sand a stroller would give me a little rest and we could still slowly move forward. I moved her to my back as we bouldered across mountains of rock.
When I woke up I was exhausted, soaked with sweat.

That was a year ago.

I was able to hold her as we stood in line, transferred to the boat, transferred to the sub and back to the boat. We had a great time together and I don’t think my daughter ever knew my fear… my fear that I would let her down. The fear that I might be just one more “No!” in a world full of people, who throughout her life, will simply look at her and tell her, “No.”

Something changed in me that day. I began working out harder at the gym, running faster and farther. I looked for better backpacks to carry her in.

With Lucy as our inspiration, Aaron and I signed up with a personal trainer and started training with him 4 days a week. I felt silly doing it, I didn’t want to tell anyone because it felt so “Hollywood!” (Um, YES! I TOTALLY have a personal TRAIN-ER!)
But I wasn’t going to be stopped by feeling silly or cliché. My reasons were bigger than that. When Jared, the owner of the gym, and Matt, our trainer, asked what our goals were, Aaron and I said, “We definitely need to be able to dead-lift 50 pounds, over and over and over again. Every single day.” I said, “I don’t care if I lose weight, but I need to get stronger. We have to increase our overall strength because we have an 8 year-old in a wheelchair and every day she is growing. We have to keep up with her!”

Jared Trevino, who owns our gym, Fit Forever, offered to come to the house and watch how we lift and transfer Lucy. He watched us load her in and out of her car seat. Then we loaded her wheelchair in and out of our car. Next we lifted her from her wheelchair and sat her on her bed, then moved her back to the wheelchair. Then we transferred her to her feeder chair at the dinner table.

I set her on her back, in the bottom of the tub. I stepped in, straddled her and lifted her out, stepping carefully over the edge, one foot at a time, like I do when she has a bath. (A maneuver that is much easier when she is fully clothed and dry.)

We put her in her small wheelchair and “bumped” her up and down the stairs. We put her in her stander and then pulled her out of it.

Jared then showed us how to do each of those things with correct form, giving us more strength, more control, protecting our lower backs and protecting Lucy. We had been doing it all wrong… but only for the last 9 years.

Our trainer, Matt Williams, says that very few of his clients train as intensely as Aaron and I train. I wonder if many of them have as much at stake as we do. We are Lucy’s legs. We are the wheelchair, when the wheelchair says “No.”

When we workout on our own, people literally stop and stare. They stop us to say that they are inspired by us and that they can see our determination. They assume we are in training for a physical, competitive event like a triathlon or marathon. When they ask what we are training for I say, “I’m training for my daughter, Lucy, who’s in a wheelchair. I’m training for our life.”

Lucy is my motivation. When I don’t want to run, I still run… and I run… because I can run. She may never run, not in her whole life, and I just won’t take my ability to do so for granted. I push myself physically so I can carry her. So I can run with her. I do it, so I can be a “Yes.”

A couple of months ago, Lucy asked, “Mom, can just you and me go to Disneyland sometime? Just you and me. Not Daddy, not Leah.” (In my mind I quietly, nervously, calculated the number of times I would need to lift her. Then I told myself to “STOP IT!” And I told my daughter, “Yes.”

“Mom, can I hike through Goblin Valley?”
“Yep.”

“Mom, can we hike all the way up to Delicate Arch?
“Absoultely!”

Let’s just say it… there’s quite a difference in my physical appearance from Signing Time Series 2 to Baby Signing Time 3 & 4. Actually, I have been all over the scale map from the first show to the most recent.

Honestly, I’ve struggled with my weight my entire life and finally, finally I’ve found something that motivates me. A reason to push myself. A reason to really ask, “Is that all you can do Rachel? Are you sure?”
One word- Lucy.

A few nights ago I carried Lucy down the hall to get her ready for bed. I placed her on her bed, so that she was sitting up and leaning against the wall. She smiled at me and said quietly, “Mom, I can tell you’re getting stronger.”

And that’s the best reward of all.

Leah and Lucy went back to school today. Shouldn’t I be jumping up and down?

Leah was up at 7 AM and made the rounds, waking us all up. “It’s the first day of school!!” She whispered excitedly. I believe some kids are built for school, and Leah is one of them. She wakes up, makes herself breakfast, gets dressed, brushes her teeth and is on her way to the bus stop, even if the rest of us are still in bed! While in class, Leah hurries to complete each assignment so she can get back to whatever book is in her desk. She comes home, does her homework and then plays with friends.

Maybe the reason I am feeling so melancholy is that I am channeling Lucy. Lucy is NOT built for school, but please don’t tell her I said so. Most of mainstream public education was not set up for “the Lucy’s” of our world. I wouldn’t want to sit (literally) from 8:30-3:30, yes she sits at recess too. She cannot do the work as quickly as the other kids and it really does take more of her energy to complete the same assignment. She is always rushed and always behind. Sometimes she just puts her head down on her desk, refusing to do any more. And does everything really need to be signaled with a LOUD, jarring bell? The poor kid practically leaps out of her skin every 45 minutes… and then there are the fire drills… need I say more? I am actually going to send earplugs for her this year!

And it’s not just that Lucy isn’t built for school, but school is not built for Lucy. Since she is in a big wheelchair, she usually ends up at the end of the line, when her class lines up. Her new classroom is set up with 3 long rows of desks, each row behind the next. Lucy can’t maneuver in between a row, so she is at the back of the class. She can’t reach a sink to wash her hands, so I send hand sanitizer. She can’t reach the water fountain, so we send water bottles. She can’t get her bin out of her desk, hang up her backpack or get it down, write, feed herself or go to the bathroom like the other kids, so she has an aide, Sally who is incredible… Lucy would do better if she could have Sally as a full-time aide, since she struggles with transitions but the district refuses to pay benefits and retirement for one full-time aide, so Lucy will have two part-time aides. And like clockwork, every week on the day that the aides transition, I will likely get a note sent home saying, “Lucy had a really hard day, she refused to work and cried a lot.” If the district lived it, like we live it, they would pay benefits, retirement and more.

This morning, Leah was off to her bus stop by 8:10. The girls go to the same school but cannot ride the same bus. Leah rides the bus with all of the kids in our neighborhood. It is not an accessible bus. Lucy’s bus has a lift in it and it is also full of kids who have different disabilities who are not mainstreamed, who do not go to her school. Having kids screaming, hollering and jumping around doesn’t work for Lucy at all. She hates the bus. We have asked the transportation office if Leah can ride with Lucy. At first we were told, “No, Leah has to have a documented disability.” (“Huh? She does!) So, now Leah rides with Lucy sometimes, and like any kid, Leah wants to ride with kids she knows, kids she likes and kids who go to her school and understandably Leah doesn’t want to be late to school every day. Yes, Lucy’s bus gets her to school late and picks her up from school early EVERY single day. Schools make a big deal out of being late, but they wave it entirely when it is their fault, which may be fine in theory but would you want to be the kid in the wheelchair who rides a bus with no one you know, who arrives to school late every single day and sits at the back of the room? Sounds like punishment, not school.

This morning the driver called and told us she would be arriving at our home at 8:45. Lucy quietly said, “I don’t want to be late on the first day.” We loaded Lucy and her manual chair into the car and took her to school. We left the heavy power wheelchair for the bus driver to deliver later. This is all after Lucy refused to eat breakfast, forcing herself to dry heave when offered toast, smoothie, juice anything. She cried 4 or 5 times about nothing and everything and I can’t blame her.

If you haven’t figured it out, there are a lot of things we love to do, we love the beach, we love to camp and hike. When Aaron and I were first married we talked about moving to Alaska for a year or moving to Hawaii for a year and we talked about how great those adventures and experiences would be for our family, when we had one. Aaron and I had checked out Kauai and looked into moving there when Leah was almost one. Shortly after Leah’s first birthday we realized that she was deaf. We still pursued Hawaii and talked to Easter Seals about early intervention. We would have to island hop for audiology exams, hearing aid issues etc. We asked if there was a deaf community and were told, “Yes!! There are about 14 people in the deaf community.”

Aaron and I shelved the idea, realizing some things may need to be put off so that Leah could have all she needed. When Lucy came along it seemed like her physical limitations might also limit some of our family activities. I hated the idea that there really is not enough accessibility in many places for her.

At one point, I made a secret promise to myself on Lucy’s behalf. I would never be the one to limit our activities because of her wheelchair.

As Leah shared in her recent post, we kicked off Summer with a family (and extended family) trip to Cancun. We left for Cancun the day after we got home from the Emmys in NYC. Cancun was great! Lucy parasailed with Aaron. We sat on the beach and played in the waves. Aaron went scuba diving, Leah snorkeled. Lucy does not like putting her face in the water and still struggles with controlling her breath so a snorkel for her could be disastrous. I came across an ad for a glass-bottom boat ride and I thought it would be perfect for Lucy! She could see the reef without getting her face wet! I called for more info and it sounded good. Very, very, very last, I told them I had an 8 year-old in a wheelchair. I was placed on hold for awhile and they came back and told me it would not be possible for us to go. The boat is not really a glass bottom boat, it is a submarine. We would load from the dock onto a speed boat first, and it would take us out to the submarine waiting in the ocean. We would have to transfer from the boat to the sub and then down a series of stairs to our seats below the surface. When the tour was over we would transfer back to the boat and then from the boat to the dock.

I hung up and thought about what they had said. There was no room for a wheelchair and we could not transfer the wheelchair. Could I do this myself? Could I carry her? Could I do it without Aaron? It would be scheduled on Aaron’s scuba day, which I KNOW he would cancel for Lucy – I kept my concern to myself. I tossed it around in my mind for hours. If Lucy knew I was concerned, she would insist she did not want to go anyway. Lucy is almost 50 pounds and I would be committing to carrying her for 5 hours and transferring her 4 times! I decided that I could do it. I called back and made our reservation, this time I didn’t say anything about a wheelchair.

The night before our submarine trip I dreamt that we arrived for the adventure. I was carrying Lucy on my hip. The guide looked at me and said, “Are you crazy? We have to walk 6 miles to the boat!” In my dream I frantically asked others if I could borrow their stroller for the 6 mile trek. I think that might qualify as a nightmare.

The day of the trip, my mom, my sister Emilie and her son Zak decided to come too. The tour bus picked us up from the hotel. Lucy thought it looked like an airplane inside. When we arrived there was a long line. Mom stood in line and I sat Lucy on the counter until we were up. We made the first two transfers and the sub ride was a blast! We saw sea turtles, schools of fish, coral reefs and so much more! The ride ended just in time, as most everyone felt a little sea sick. We transfered back to the boat without a hitch.

It may seem like a little thing, but secretly I was really proud of myself.