By Cheryl Stowe
When Rob was in residency, we lived in Savannah, GA. We didn’t have money, and we didn’t live in the best part of town. Now, to be clear, mid- and downtown Savannah are a bit strange in that fabulous mansions and rundown trap houses can share the same block. But houses like ours – 2 […]
Read More
I was thinking about the show “Sex and the City”, and the ways that show changed the female narrative. It was very positive and empowering in a lot of ways. It gave us permission to be sexually bold and selfish. It violated the social contract – the long-held belief that women aren’t allowed to ever […]
Read More
This story is 100% unretouched and unembellished. I pulled into the blue spot at the Dollar General, and noticed that the SUV in the blue spot next to mine had no plate or placard. Fortunately, the driver was by his car. Me, rolling down my window: “Hey, do you have a handicapped tag?” […]
Read More
When Ana was first learning to talk, we weren’t sure what she should call my stepdad. Mom and Steve were just dating at that point, so “Grandpa” wasn’t yet appropriate. But we all knew the relationship was probably headed toward marriage, so “Steve” wasn’t quite right either. While we struggled to find a name, whenever […]
Read More
(From 2013) My elderly, deaf, arthritic, German Shepherd just expressed for the first time in over a year that she was interested in going ANYWHERE other than her bed and the backyard. I was fixing a cup of coffee, and she came and got me, and walked me to the front door. This never happens, […]
Read More
Rob and I had been dating for over a year, and had been living together for just a few months, when I woke him up in the middle of the night, climbed on top of him, and pinned him down. (This is not a sex story. Those who have arrived at the wrong classroom are […]
Read MoreErick Rehkopf, the man who crashed his car, drunk, and caused my injury, pled guilty to aggravated vehicular assault, a Class D Felony, in October 2006. The offense carried a three-year sentence which, at the Judge’s discretion, could be served through a variety of methods, from simple probation to a full term of jail time. […]
Read More
At Erick Rehkopf’s sentencing hearing, I read the following statement: Your honor, when the defendant chose to drive his car with three passengers while intoxicated and crashed it into the back of a turning tractor trailer, I sustained serious, life-threatening injuries. Two of my ribs were broken, my scalp was peeled back from the top […]
Read More
Spinal cord injury support group meetings are unbearable. They are typically one hour, once a month, held at a hospital, and run and organized by staff who have never had a disability. The format is not honest discussion among those with injuries (as implied by the words SCI, support, and group), but rather a presentation […]
Read More
I urinated all over myself in front of four mothers and their small children, whom they clutched to themselves in horror, in a Pilot Travel Center gas station restroom just over the Kentucky State line in 2005. Ana looked on in stunned disbelief as the dark spot spread down my jeans. The warm liquid traveled […]
Read More