Remote Work Is Accessibility — Especially in Winter

"You know what's wild? That some people can just walk in the snow and ice and aren't worried about it, and if they fall, they can get up themselves. Like how?!"

A few weeks ago, I said that to my boyfriend after walking the few minutes back to the car from the sushi restaurant where we had dinner. Whenever I'm out with him in the winter, I'm cautious-but-not-that-nervous walking anywhere, because I know if I slip and fall, he'll pick me up.

Living with a muscle/mobility disability though, my nervousness goes way up when it's winter and I'm out by myself — which is the majority of times I'm out, because I live alone. Snowy uneven parking lots, icy sidewalks, snow piled on or along curbs making them even harder to step up on, I hate it all 😤

I've barely gone anywhere this month because I've had a bad cough for 3 weeks, but finally dragged myself out on Monday to the walk-in clinic/x-ray lab and then the pharmacy — and because I was nervous about walking around parking lots and up curbs so soon after Sunday's snowstorm, I went straight home after, instead of doing the errands I'd wanted to do.

I hear a lot about accessibility issues in winter for people who use wheelchairs and other mobility aids, which are a real and important issue.

I hear less about whether people realize how much it affects people with physical disabilities who don't use mobility aids too.

I was lucky that for 11+ years, I had a job where I could work from home, only having to travel locally to meetings once or twice a month in winter. Now that I'm self-employed, I'm lucky to continue being able to work from home.

But that's not the reality for many people with disabilities — people who aren't permitted to work remotely, and have to navigate snow-piled bus stops or uneven parking lots to get to their jobs.

Remote work options aren't a "nice to have" — they're the difference in whether someone with a disability can accept a job or not, and whether employees with disabilities can get to their jobs safely.

Remote work IS accessibility, and every time I hear my non-disabled friends talk about their commutes that I know would exhaust me or skyrocket my nerves every day if I had to do them, I wish more workplaces realized that. ✊🏽

(Photo is a throwback to last Feb when I drove through a snowstorm to get to a CHCH Morning Live interview, because for all the reasons above, I have almost no photos of myself in snow 😂)