Accidentally Adaptive: Addison Bay Side-Zip Crewneck

Fall is here, and so is my desire to stay warm and cozy all the time in comfy layers. But a lot of times, adding layers is better for me in theory than it is in reality. Anything too tight or too bulky is really hard for me to move around in, and it often ends up getting really bunched up around my waist, because things fit differently when you're seated. But this Addison Bay Crewneck, with zippers on both sides, is an accidentally adaptive solution to my problems!

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SMA Pride Month: What I Wish People Knew

For my last post of the series this year, I thought I'd share some things that I wish people knew and understood about my life. I want to share some of the big and small things - the things that you might not realize, or things that I've maybe mentioned before but are worth repeating.

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Accidentally Adaptive: Crocs Sandals

I know that the end of August is not necessarily the ideal time to be posting a pair of sandals, but I just bought these recently and was so excited that I wanted to share. I saw these Brooklyn Buckle Crocs sandals online and placed an order almost immediately. They're incredibly comfortable, surprisingly cute, and adjustable and adaptive, too.

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SMA Pride Month: Biggest Lessons Learned

A lot of times, my life with SMA feels pretty normal to me - I've got my routine down, and I don't feel like I'm living all that differently than everyone else. But there have been times, over the years, where I've tried a little hard to pretend to be normal... and regretted it afterwards. Times when I didn't really fully embrace and accept the impact SMA has on me. So I thought I'd explain a little bit about those times today.

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SMA Pride Month: Current Adaptive Favorites

I think it's pretty obvious that SMA affects a lot of my day-to-day life - it forces me to be creative, and come up with different ways of doing things. And sometimes it's taking things and using them in a way that has an extra benefit to me - like the things I talk about in my Accidentally Adaptive series. So I thought I'd share some of my current favorite "adaptive" products - things that I use to make my life a little bit easier.

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Disability Pride Month: Disability Representation on Screen

This week, I wanted to share some recommendations for good disability representation on screen. When I say good representation, I mean that the stories told aren't cliche stories of disabled people as burdens, or as someone to be pitied, AND that the actors playing these characters are disabled themselves. This list isn't exhaustive, but the full version of that list wouldn't be that long, either. We still have a looong way to go until disabled people really feel represented on screen.

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Accidentally Adaptive: Artis Makeup Brushes

I am not necessarily the most skilled at doing my own makeup, but it is something I enjoy doing. It's fun to play around with new products and shades, and try out different looks. It's one of the few steps of the getting ready process that I can still do mostly independently, but I've had to come up with little hacks and workarounds to make it work for me and my mobility. One of the products I've found that makes it a little easier for me is my Artis foundation brush.

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Disability Pride Month: My Caregiving Situation

I think I've share a little bit about my care needs before, but I don't think I've ever written a full post about it exclusively. It's on the top of my mind right now because my PCA (personal care attendant) was out on vacation last week, so my life was a little more chaotic than usual. I typically use the term PCA when I'm referring to someone who is paid to help me with my needs. Some people might use the word caregiver, some people might use the word aide - there are lots of different terms that get used, but they all mean roughly the same thing. Just wanted to get the language out of the way upfront! Personally, I have a mix of PCAs (well, right now, I have one PCA - more on that in a bit) and unpaid caregivers… aka my parents.

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Accidentally Adaptive: My Cup Holder

I think today's post might be the first real "Accidentally Adaptive" thing I started using in my own life, many many years ago! Really, the concept of accidentally adaptive came around out of necessity - there aren't that many purposefully adaptive things now, and there were even fewer 10 or 20 years ago. So I found products that already existed to fill the hole of a need in my life - like this cup holder.

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