Putting the ability back into disABILITY
Dr Joanna Baker-Rogers Founder of Busy Life speaks to us about how the challenge of changing career late in life has led to her become a champion for inclusion for all.
Joanna says that she spent 50 years in denial that she had a disability. Like many people her age, she was brought up to believe that disability made a person ‘lesser’ and ‘other’, and she certainly didn’t identify with this! Joanna is also the parent of a child with special needs, and this experience combined with her subsequent studies, introduced a whole new world to her – which embraced and celebrated disability. This utterly changed her perspective, and she became incredibly proud of her disABILITY.Joanna believes that disability is a naturally occurring phenomenon: there is no normal, there are just a greater number of people who are neurotypical and able-bodied.
Her business, Busy Life, is an e-commerce business that values diversity and inclusion, with a focus on parasport. Busy Life’s mission is to empower and inspire everyone to take part in sport or simply to be more active, regardless of any impairment they may have. Their ethos is that everyone has ability and that’s why they choose to write disABILITY the way they do!
