Mom & Daughter Duo Take To Social Media To Show The Importance Of Accessibility And Inclusion
A mom and daughter duo has taken to social media to highlight wheelchair-inclusive design, and to show that disabilities are not the problem, but the lack of accessibility is.
Dallas has quadriplegic spastic cerebral palsy, which makes it difficult for her to walk. Because of this, she uses a walker and a wheelchair to get around.
Unfortunately, most places are not wheelchair accessible, which left Dallas unable to do a lot of the things that kids her age get to do.
When she first got her wheelchair, they stopped going to parks because there was nothing for her to do there. She would just sit and watch the other kids, wishing she could play with them.
Finally, they found a park that had an inclusive playground and Dallas was able to play. There is a wheelchair swing there that she loves going on.
Dallas’ mom, Katrina Placzek, gets choked up just thinking about how happy that swing made Dallas. For the first time, she was finally able to enjoy the park like other kids.
“To see how inclusion makes someone feel in front of your eyes, it was like, I think I need to show the world,” Placzek said.
That’s when Placzek took to social media to show everyone just how important accessibility and inclusion is.
“The most important thing is just for people to think about disabled children and think about disabled adults when they’re making a business or they’re designing a playground,” Placzek said.
“A lot of people think that there’s not a lot of people in wheelchairs or there’s not a lot of disabled people but the reason why you probably don’t see a lot is because the world is not very accessible for them, so there’s a lot of places that they can’t go.”
Click here to follow along with Dallas’ journey on her Instagram, and hear her story in the video below:
