The people closest to me, like the 3 munchkins above “get” me. They accept me for who I am, disabilities and all, and take my limitations in stride – really as if there are no limitations at all! I love them! These three young adults are great human beings. They treat others with respect, and I rarely, if ever, want to beat them with my cane.

I don’t know about the rest of y’all out there living with disability and/or chronic illness, but the hardest thing for me to do is to forgive someone who says or does something to ‘dis me as a person with disability. Did you know that there are apology languages? Drs. Jennifer Thomas and Gary Chapman wrote a book called, “The 5 Languages of Apology” (Expressing regret, Accepting responsibility, Making restitution, Genuine repentance [change], and Requesting forgiveness) and it is being used more and more in relationship psychology. I encourage you to check it out.

However, my point today is forgiving someone for being a butthead, and no apology is forthcoming, nor will it likely ever be spoken. Forgiving someone who doesn’t say “I’m sorry“. Ugh! That is incredibly hard for me to do.

Monday I was in my favorite grocery store, Giant. I love this particular store because the aisles are super wide and I can navigate safely in there most of the time. My husband has been sick with a cough/cold. He even missed some work so I knew the man was REALLY sick. (Especially after he even went to the doctor!) Before walking into the store, I texted him and asked him if I could get him anything since he was starting to feel like eating again.

“Spaghetti-o’s with franks, please“. (Gross… am I right?)

So I found the aisle with all the canned and boxed goods for children (ahem), found the spaghetti-o’s on a shelf about ankle-high, picked up a couple of cans and promptly dropped them on the floor as I stood.

That by itself is not unusual. I have suck-poor grasping abilities. I was just getting ready to ask Milo (my service dog) to “fetch cans”, when a hand reached out and plucked them from the floor.

It startled me but I had the good sense to say, “Oh. Um. Thanks!” In my normal day, I get that people just want to help.

“You’re welcome. I could tell you would never get those“, she replied.

I paused. Actually, I COULD get those. It would take me a second or two longer while I used cane, and deep breathes while bending to get them, but I could have done it. Milo, also, loves getting cans. So I had this covered. That wasn’t what bothered me either. I always assume people mean well.

What bothered me was what she said next.

“You know they have a service here for people to shop for you and just deliver the food for people like you?” she gritted out with a fake smile. Even hearing bionically, with all the nonverbal cues going on, I could tell she said it with some SNARK.

I paused again and made sure my attitude had it’s hat on straight before saying, “Yes, I have some friends who use that and really love it!” So I’m still not thinking at this point that I deserve an apology – yet. I’m cool. As a cucumber.

But then she said, “You should use it too. That way you aren’t taking up so much space in the aisles and making the rest of us wait.”

I paused again. I wanted to make sure my cochlear implant really heard what I thought I heard. So I asked, “Did you say I should use the service because my being here makes shopping difficult for YOU? I think I’m offended” (said with a cheeky smile to let her know I was giving her the benefit of the doubt).

“Yes,” she said as she turned with a flip to her hair and walking off with her cart. I felt like “flipping” her. I’ve always enjoyed using some universal sign…

The rest of my grocery store shopping experience was spent grumbling and mumbling under my breath. I mean, I deserved an apology! Right? I wanted to go hunt her down and beat her with my cane.

Yet, I knew I wasn’t going to get one. Not from this butthead stranger. I was mad at her for the rest of the day. By the end of the day I realized I had let this ruin my entire day. I needed to forgive her and go on, even if she didn’t deserve my forgiveness especially since there was not an apology.

I think it is really easy to get bent out of shape when someone hurts your feelings or acts offensive and it has something to do with your disability or illness. I mean, at the time… I felt my heart swell with righteous indignation. It changed to heartburn and indigestion fairly quickly, but still! If ever someone deserved a good ol’ cane beating, it was her!

One of the classes I teach at the community college is “Psychology of Relationships”. We have a whole chapter on forgiveness. A whole chapter! Here are some of the benefits of forgiving… even when an apology isn’t issued:

  1. Healthier relationships (even w/ others – those who did not betray you)  

    2. Greater spiritual and psychological well-being

    3. Less anxiety, stress and hostility

    4. Lower blood pressure

    5. Fewer symptoms of depression

    6. Lower risk of alcohol and substance abuse (Miller, 2014).

These are great benefits to YOU… the person who is doing the forgiving. And yes, even when there is no apology prefacing the forgiveness you extend.

Another personal example, about 13 years ago I lived in a different city in the mountain areas of Maryland. I was new to my cochlear implant and not yet partnered with a service dog. I was shopping in the SAM’S warehouse looking at some items in one of the aisles. Next thing I knew I was shoved and ended up on my back in the aisle, blinking up at a very surprised “shover”.

They immediately bent to help me up and apologized that their shove sent me to floor. “Why didn’t you move?” she asked. “I thought you were ignoring me!”

“I’m deaf“, I explained. I watched as all the color drained from her face and was replaced with horror and self-recrimination. (Not sure what color horror is but I saw it her face, clear as day). She immediately apologized over and over and even had big tears in her eyes.

THIS person was really easy to forgive. Yup, they screwed up. (I mean, who goes around shoving total strangers?) They said they were sorry and made it obvious they were mortified and repentant. I felt no compulsion to beat them with my cane. They even called themselves an “asshole” (which saved me the trouble). I thought about the experience the rest of the day trying to figure out how to insure that it didn’t happen again. However, I did NOT spend the rest of the day being mad at this person.

Two different scenarios and both having to do with my acquired disability. Something I never signed up for. One was hard to forgive, and the other was easy. Yet, both required me to forgive them because I have enough stuff going on in my life without hanging on to extra “weight” that I didn’t need to be dragging along.

I’ve always thought it would feel pretty satisfying to beat someone with my cane who deserved it. I just wasn’t sure jail time was worth it. The older I get, the more I understand that forgiving others isn’t for THEIR sake, it is for YOUR sake.

I hope you can learn to forgive others when they do something crappy or hurt your feelings about something to do with your own challenges. It isn’t easy, but forgiving them is better for YOU. Living a life as a differently-abled person is hard enough without adding another difficult layer to day-to-day life. Someone totally deserve a confrontation and a major telling-off? Put the cane down and walk away.

Well… take the cane with you as you may need it. But no beating!

Miller, R. S. (2014). Intimate relationships (7th ed.). New York: McGraw Hill Publishing

©2018 Personal Hearing Loss Journal

L. Denise Portis, Ph.D.