In tribute to #ADA30, I'm finally working up the courage to compose my thoughts on my own *invisible* disability. This THREAD is about my own long-standing ableism, and how defending my right to exist in the time of #COVIDー19 has opened my eyes to how I've been hoodwinked.

As a person with a disabling health condition that no one can see, I have spent my adult life either a) trying to hide my condition or b) chasing the dream of finding the RIGHT diet, the RIGHT supplement, the RIGHT exercise routine that will magically make me DISEASE-FREE.

I have sought being abled as a goal. I wanted a "before and after" narrative. From sick to whole. From frail to fit. And I went down a massive rabbit hole of nutrition research chasing that narrative. Some of what I learned and tried helped my body. A lot of it damaged my soul.

The AIP/Wahls Protocol diets *did* help me feel better. But they were not the magic bullets I wanted and hoped them to be. I spun my wheels on meal planning day and night, convinced if I got it JUST RIGHT I would be CURED. I would be a poster child for good health.

Well, I was never cured. My health improved, but it was no miracle. And when I flared? When I hurt so bad I needed help up the stairs? When my skin was on fire or my mind a bowl of jello? I felt shame. Deep shame. Like somehow, I had failed.

Because being abled was the goal, I never could feel an ounce of acceptance for my body THE WAY IT IS. And I just kept seeking, seeking, seeking that magic bullet. Forever in the thrall of the idea of an able body.

Now enter #COVIDー19. A disease that promises to destroy me. Kill me. I watch in HORROR as the same diet gurus who sent me chasing this health ideal feverishly claim that they have all the ANSWERS for beating an unknown virus, with unknown consequences to human health.

Their magic answers? The same dietary guidelines I have been faithfully following for 5 YEARS. I guarantee you, unless you're Dr. Terry Wahls herself, my diet is better than yours. Vitamin D status? Been supplementing for years. There's not a trick in the book I don't know.

So, revelation time. These so-called health practitioners are telling people, vulnerable people who could die from COVID, to follow the same guidelines they sucked me in with to somehow be BULLET PROOF from the ravages of a novel disease.

Never have I been more aware of the trap of ableism. Do this, do that - if you take PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY, your body will cooperate and not get sick. Take vitamin D and I guarantee you won't die from a virus we still know nothing about. The hubris is breathtaking.

And it all comes crashing in. The prison I have put myself in, of needing to be a success story. Needing to be able-bodied to prove something to the world about my virtue, my restraint, my willpower. And that COVID doesn't give a shit about those things.

And the health "gurus" drone on. And I know deep in my heart that if I died of COVID they would respond with a tsk-tsk and shake of the head. Too bad I didn't try hard enough. Too bad I didn't have the strength of will to make myself into a paragon of health, like them. Too bad.

This is an industry in need of deep examination of its values and priorities. If you make money telling people like me to expect miracles, and now you're expanding your empire by telling able-bodied people that you'll make them COVID-proof using the same principles - watch out.

Because in the end, blood will be on your hands. If you're a naturopath, in functional medicine, in any alternative health practice - be mindful of what you promise, what you sell. I was sold a bill of goods. If you tell people you can COVID-proof them, that's what you're doing.

I'm beginning the long road of accepting my disabled body. Finding community, and a new kind of strength, a new sense of promise. I still eat my veggies and take my vitamin D - but not in the hope that it will make me whole. Because I'm already whole.

In just the last few weeks I have had non-conspiracy-minded friends and family tell me:
- vit D status determines the severity of COVID
- eating fermented food prevents COVID
- COVID can be easily cured with Chinese herbs
- the Paleo diet prevents COVID

NONE are true.

All of these theories provide a false sense of security about a novel virus with unknown long-term consequences, and promote risk-taking behaviors. If you promote one of these theories, you are promoting preventable death and disease.

What’s worse is that I’m told that my caution is unwarranted. My healthy lifestyle and diet will obviously protect me. I know my body and what it’s been through. Nothing could be further from the truth. But I am treated like an alarmist for not wanting to die.

Nobody is misinformation-proof in a pandemic. It's not just the HCQ peddlers or the anti-maskers. It's you, it's me, it's all of us - hoping we can be spared. It's the myth of CONTROL over our bodies - a myth that disabled don't have the luxury of clinging to.

Disabled people have to live w/ lack of control - over our bodies, over this pandemic. It's one of the reasons we're viewed as disposable. We remind people of their fragility & mortality. If we're othered, dehumanized enough - nobody has to think they're next when *we* die. /END