Cripping the Runway

Anyone who knows me knows that I have a passion for fashion. My family teases me and jokingly calls me the “fashionista.” My sister, cousins, and friends all come to me for fashion advice, and even go shopping in my closet, sometimes without my permission. When I was 15, and had to think of a talent to show off for a how to video project, I made my little brother pose as my before and after fashion model. I have always loved fashion, even back in my Barbie and American Girl Doll days, but I haven’t always known how to make it work for me.

A lot of girls go through that to some extent, I think. Wanting to look like the fabulous girls in the magazines, and realizing it’s not possible without some serious Photoshop, but for me it was different. It wasn't just models in magazines I couldn't match up to, it was my friends. It wasn't just that I couldn't look like Kate Moss or Heidi Klum, it was that in the halls of my elementary school, middle school, and high school, and even on the “real girl” pages of magazines there was no one who looked like me.

They had fashion advice for tall girls and short girls, for girls with big chests and girls with no chests, for curvy girls, and girls who were straight up and down. They had advice for apples, and pears, and girls with hourglass figures. They showed girls with light skin and dark skin and every shade in between. They proudly claimed to be for every girl, but never once did I see a girl like me.

On the pages that exclaimed, “Fashion for Every Body,” bodies like mine were conspicuously absent. To be part of the “every girl” they talked about, I had to make my disabled body fit into an able-bodied box. I would read that “every girl should own ballet flats, wedges, and heels” when my feet usually only fit into sneakers. I would read that I should be wearing skinny jeans and microminis that never worked with my chair, no matter how hard I tried.

I came up with creative ways to stay in style. I cut the seams on Ugg boots to make them fit over my braces. I proudly rocked the leggings trend. I had all the coolest purses and accessories, although even that was a challenge sometimes. I forced my body, especially my feet, into things that were excruciatingly painful, because that’s what I was supposed to be wearing. After a lot of trial and error, and often times a lot of wasted money, I made it work.

Looking like everyone else, and fitting in came at a cost though, and I'm not just talking about money. I spent most of my adolescent and young adult life hating my body. I'm still working through that now. I hated my body because it wasn't considered normal, and it certainly wasn't considered beautiful. It is only very recently that I am able to look in a mirror and not immediately respond to my reflection with a cringe, and the word “gross.” It is only recently that I have accepted that when it comes to footwear, functionality has to come first. (My friend, Maria has a blog dedicated to the challenge that is finding shoes when you have CP). I rarely read fashion magazines anymore.

I still have good style, and I still love fashion, but I'm learning to choose what works for me, and to stop trying to force my body to fit into the able-bodied world. It’s a challenge, I promise you. Being a“crip fashionista” is a full-time job. Disabled women have it twice as hard. The fashion world struggles to be inclusive in general, but they completely ignore the fact that our bodies exist. We are expected to dress the part, just like everyone else, but all too often there are very few traditional options that fit the bill.

When people compliment my style, I smile, laugh, and say thank you. Every once in while I’ll say,” thank you, it’s quite a challenge,” or I will make a joke about owning the same dress in six different colors. Every time someone compliments my style I think about how hard it is. I think about the amount of time and energy that went into finding that one outfit that works.

It’s time to stop excluding disabled bodies from definitions of beauty. When you say everybody is beautiful it’s time to start showing disabled women and girls too. It’s time to stop reinforcing the notion that to be considered beautiful you must be, or at least appear to be, able-bodied, otherwise you are “pretty for a disabled girl” or “too pretty to be disabled.” It’s time to stop saying that being disabled means your body doesn't count.

It’s time to crip the pages of Vogue, Elle, Nylon, and Seventeen. It’s time for crip couture. It’s time to crip the runway.