Posted on 11/16/2017 6:11:20 AM PST by KeyLargo
Mom With MS Finds Nasty Note After Parking In Handicapped Spot
By Shannon Antinori, Patch National Staff | Nov 15, 2017 Updated Nov 15, 2017
"You need to think twice before judging someone," the Plainfield mom said. " You have no idea what they've been through." By Shannon Antinori, Patch National Staff | Nov 15, 2017 2:22 pm ET | Updated Nov 15, 2017 11:50 pm ET
PLAINFIELD, IL From all outward appearances, Michele Clarke, 39, looks young and healthy. But 16 years ago, the Plainfield mom was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Since then she has had to battle back from flare-ups that have at times left her using a cane or a wheelchair, and even hospitalized for weeks at a time.
"Then there's times when I'm able to go to the gym and build up my strength," she told Patch.
Like many who suffer from "invisible diseases," Clarke said that for many years she was hesitant about using the handicapped placard for fear of being judged.
"It almost gets to the point where I'm afraid to use it," she said, "just because I'm not in a walker or I'm not using a cane ... I may look good on the outside, but on the inside I'm struggling."
Her fears came true on Monday, Clarke said, when she took her 12-year-old daughter to a doctor's office on 127th Street in Plainfield. As she was getting into the car, her daughter handed her a note that had been left on the passenger side windshield.
(Excerpt) Read more at patch.com ...
I had a Soccer Mom flip me off while her Teenage Daughter was sitting next to her in her SUV.
My crime? I have TRUMP 45 Vanity License Plates on my Car.
Bump!
Oklahoma. It’s a hang tag that can be hung on the mirror when using a handicap space, and is marked what month and year it expires.
"Then there's times when I'm able to go to the gym and build up my strength"I was once in a shopping plaza with a gym located next to a pharmacy with handicap parking right in front of both. I saw a young healthy looking woman, with a gym bag, come out of a car (with the tag) in one of those spots and go into the gym."I may look good on the outside, but on the inside I'm struggling."
Thinking maybe she was going to use equipment that has nothing to do with walking, I didn't prejudge. But within a a few minutes, I saw the same woman get on a thread mill facing out the front store windows, where she ran for at least the 10 minutes I waited to watch.
People respect people using handicap spots WHEN their physical handicap limits their ability to walk. Not for VIP parking to use a thread-mill in a gym. As for days when the are 'struggling on the inside' but healthy enough physically to go to a gym and build their strength... Let them build their strength by walking like the rest of us.
My point - you can’t always tell because some very legitimate handicaps don’t show; however, the number of handicap places for commercial establishments always seems to be way more than needed. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a parking lot with all of the handicap places filled.
“I dont believe Ive ever seen a parking lot with all of the handicap places filled.”
Take a trip to any Wally World...
My 18 year old daughter was recently diagnosed with MS...
Liberals just always want to think they are “saving the world” but usually end up just being a-holes.
I have had my handicap placard for six years. My plates are my amateur radio call sign.
People don’t understand the placards require a drs. prescription based on certain guidelines that can range anywhere from severe COPD to osteoarthritis.
My car has a scooter lift, so nobody has ever questioned me, but my husband’s car has the placard only.
Liberals just always want to think they are saving the world but usually end up just being a-holes.
I’ve actually been in situations where, while I was waiting, all of the other handicapped stalls got taken. And when they guy was pulling into the last open one, I started up the car and left my space. i.e. I was not an encumbrance to ANYONE.
I don’t think it’s a good practice to challenge anyone using a handicapped space just because he/she does not look handicapped. I agree there are some places at whcih there is a surfeit of handicapped spaces that seem never all filled. By the same token there are some locations with only 2 spaces that are almost always filled.
Who said anything about handicap tags. The issue is apparently fully fit people parking their cars in handicap spaces. If someone needed the space because of a handicap the possession of a tag is neither here nor there. Similarly just because you have a tag, does not automatically ethically entitle you to use the space, if you or your passenger are not handicapped.
Only if you are three years old or abysmally ignorant.
Which are you?
How does she hear emergency vehicles?
The flashing lights on top of emergency vehicles are not just for fun. They are there so people who can not hear the siren, whether they are deaf or just have their stupid music on so loud people are singing along three counties away, will have a visual clue.
The only handicapped places that I've seen filled are the ones at work here, specifically I park near another building very near the handicapped places for that building and then walk a couple of hundred yards to the building in which I work. Strangely enough one of the women who work on my floor parks in one of the handicap spaces for the other building and also walks a couple of hundred yards to the my building. Plus she goes out to lunch quite frequently, and I've seen her walk to her car and back again. I'd venture to say she isn't all that handicapped, but is taking advantage of the sticker to get a reserved parking place.
By being a democrat...
I can’t believe how ignorant supposedly intelligent people can be. Ignorant in the fact that they don’t know what they’re talking about not that they are simply “ignorant.”
States differ on placards and disability license plates. Just because your state doesn’t charge for a disability plate doesn’t mean other states don’t.
MS is not a hereditary disease so the mother isn’t passing MS on to her daughter.
As a person living with MS (and have been for 15 years) and a person with a disability placard I think I can speak to both of these issues.
I rarely use my placard simply because I try and use the opportunity for exercise - walking from the farthest spot that I can reasonably expect to walk from. However there are days when I know I may be able to walk into the store that by the time I leave I’ll be lucky to get back to my pickup. Yes I drive a pickup that is more difficult to get into at times but I do it because I LIKE pickups. I’m waiting for the day some IGNORANT individual says something about me parking in a disabled spot. I will enjoy publicly ridiculing them and attempt to make them feel about the size of a flea.
Before you (not any individual here but the general YOU) make some comment or judgement about someones ability to do or not do something stop and use your FRICKIN’ mind. Can you tell a Wounded Warrior is missing a leg or half his intestines by outside appearances if the injury is covered? Are you going to begrudge him a Handicapped spot? Does everyone have to have a wheelchair or pair of crutches to have difficulty walking? And if they’re not taking a handicapped spot away from you then it’s not any of your DAMNED business.
Grow up and get a life.
And so ends my first post. Hope you enjoyed it but then I don’t give a rat’s rear end if you did or not.
It’s referenced in the note, so it was in use...
Read the article again. The issue was handicap tags. Here’s a part of the article about her hesitancy to use her handicap PLACARD:
“Like many who suffer from “invisible diseases,” Clarke said that for many years she was hesitant about using the handicapped placard for fear of being judged.
“It almost gets to the point where I’m afraid to use it,” she said, “just because I’m not in a walker or I’m not using a cane.”
It’s ILLEGAL to park in a handicap spot, without one. And I would NEVER use my husband’s handicap tag, if he wasn’t in the car!
Cowards hide in anonymity like people who attack others on the internet behind anonymous names.
There are 10’s of thousands of fraudulent ones in CA, I heard the other day that there are something like 27,000 listed for people over 100 and only 6 or 8 thousand centenarians in the whole state.
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