Popular wheelchair forums and blogs

Internet blogs and forums survive on the fact that everyone has an opinion on an issue that they want to share. This is no different with wheelchair users. In fact, their presence in the World Wide Web is greatly felt through forums and blogs like Apparelyzed and Gimpy Mumpy.  

Apparelyzed, www.apparelyzed.com,  is an online forum and doubles as a support group for people who suffer from spinal cord injury. The website is based in the UK and thus far they have gathered 755 registered members. Popular discussions here include topics relating to equipment, sports, spouse and care-givers, parents, relationships and traveling tips. The site also incorporates plenty of reading material helpful to the newly disabled. One of the more prominent aspects of the members at Apparelyzed is that most of them are thoroughly optimistic with life. Luckily for most of the visitors, their optimism is contagious.

Understanding the need for peer support, the United Spinal Association has also launched a website named Action Online, www.unitedspinal.org/publications/orbit/.  This publication website encourages writers to send in their articles to be published here. The categories listed include Adaptive Sports and Recreation, Accessibility Issues, Community and Research. Visitors gain total access to all articles and are able to leave their personal comments at the site, much like how a normal blog works. As the site has been up since 2004, there are literally hundreds of articles for reference.  

If you are one for a more personal approach, www.Brokenclay.org maybe a better place to visit. Jumpstarted in March 2001 by a computer programmer who struggles with paralysis, this site is actually a journal documenting a first-person’s daily view on paralysis. The possible eye-opening experience of reading someone else’s journal or the witty personality of the entries has attracted close to 25 000 hits since the conception of the blog.  

Indeed, the variety of forums and blogs truly work well to help the disabled handle their predicament with a more positive perspective. With this, users get to learn from others on how to cope with their disability and learn from others who have experienced the same predicament. This has been possible through the use of the Internet, which has successfully changed the way we communicate, even for the disabled.