Well, this one snuck up on me this year. Years ago, I bought t-shirts for Kev, Immy & I and they did what they were meant to – they got our friends and colleagues asking questions. I love questions. Inquisitive ones that is, not rude ones, but thankfully, no-one in our lives has ever vemtured a rude question. To them, I am just me.

And this is a realisation I have finally begun to come to for myself when it comes to disabled identity.

I absolutely denied the fact that I had one at all. For years. The sight of myself, my scissor pattern staggering made me miserable. I hated – and honestly, still hate – not looking like others. Being othered.

People can and do other you. As a species, for survival I guess, we like it when people are like us. We understand it when people are like us. On a biological level, if someone isn’t like us, they’re weaker.

That’s the message I have carried around my whole life. I thought I was weak. I thought I couldn’t cope. I wanted only to change myself, angry that I couldn’t, trapped in a body that just won’t do what I want it to do.

Then there’s people who will see my physical differences and assume that I need them in some way. They think I need their help, or their pity.

The worst one for me is people that call me an inspiration. Don’t do that. Because all I am doing is living my life. This is the only one I get, I am only trying to do everything that you are too. Yes, it is harder, thank you for noticing that is harder, but it doesn’t make me better than you for getting through the day. I’m not trying to inspire you, I’m just being real, being me.

And you know what I realise? That’s it. The crux. I’m being me. I am not disability first, as I was when I was growing up. I’m me first. Yes, my limbs get tired and oh my days, how cross it makes me when stairs don’t have banisters, or when the NHS cannot support long term conditions and seem only set up to pretend that we’re not there, that disabled children don’t grow into disabled adults(!)

I am here. With my sore neck that I keep jarring because I will never remember not to scrape my toes across uneven paving. I am me, with two daughters who know that when they hold my hand as we cross the road, it is not just me keeping them safe, they are keeping me safe.

They are the inspiration, not me. I got out of bed this morning. So did you. So did they. But let me ask you, what choice did any of us have? We either embrace the new day we have been given, or we curl up and die. Who would choose that?

So, don’t call me an inspiration. Because that phrase is not designed to make me feel good, did you know that? It’s about you. And this life, that I never asked for, will never be about you. And that’s OK. I’m getting to grips with it.

I am 1 in 400 living with cerebral palsy. With it. I have it. It does not have me. And if you want to call me an inspiration, I’ll smile. And when you say it, I’ll be thinking “Ah, there goes another person admitting they could not live the way I do.” The acceptable face of pity, perhaps? I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. Because what that teaches me is that I am strong. Without choice and I think that’s the part that the inspo-brigade forget. Nobody would choose this.

But it is only one part of who I am. I will never escape it, but equally, it can never claim me. Because yes, I am an CP warrior. Winning my battles because I can’t win the war. But that’s OK too. Because I have other things to be. Blogger. Avid reader. Learner. Wife. Mum.

I am enough, disabled identity and all.