Explain How To Deal With Changes In Realities, Self-Image And Relationships

1.3. Dealing With Changes in Priorities, Self-Image and Relationships

Disability may occur from various instances: unexpected illnesses, accidents or deteriorating health conditions. This sudden change may cause one’s life to spiral out of control, far from the life they once led. Changes will occur, even to oneself and may cause the individual to go through an excruciating process of adjustment that may or may not open his or her eyes to a new light. It isn’t easy accepting lost of control of bodily functions or dealing with reduced mobility. The outcome all depends on how a person deals with the change of life, daily routines and how he or she meets the challenges to be faced ahead.

Measuring our worth and how we perceive ourselves can

The loss of a loved one’s ability tends to ripple further throughout the family. To think that a partner or loved one would not be able to do the usual activities can be disheartening to his or her significant others, bringing great strain to their relationship and putting it to a test.

According to Brehm (1981):
The result of disability is that the well partners become more like parents or nurses, which not only detracts from the relationships, but also may cause resentment, which in turn may lead to irritability or frustration and a lack of communication.

But to think and believe that no disabled person can survive a happy and fulfilling relationship is wrong for this is not always the case. You would be surprised though to find out that some people with the disability, however, put their relationships to an end themselves. They often feel that their partner would be better off with him or her, or may even tend to feel he or she is holding them

(1991):

This may be magnified exponentially when illness takes away individuals’ abilities to engage in activities they perceive as essential to their lives. An athlete’s chronic illness, for example, may sideline a promising future that he trained for since childhood. A woman who expressed herself through the visual arts may be devastated by severe vision impairment. A mother with unrelenting back pain may be unable to care for her children. Similarly, a loss of body parts—for example, for a woman who has undergone a mastectomy or whose hair falls out as a consequence of chemotherapy—can disrupt someone’s sense of self.

The loss of function, aggravated by the loss of status or identity, may diminish self-esteem and fracture body image, which in turn fuels anxiety and depression. Because disability can strip away many of the characteristics that form identity at the same time it causes disability and loss of livelihood, the totality of the losses is potentially enormous. Since these losses aren’t tied to one event but are multiple and repetitive, the ill person may live with perpetual grief, known as chronic sorrow or sadness (Ornstein et al.,