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The Impact of Being a YouTuber With Cerebral Palsy

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I decided to start a YouTube channel a few years ago to spread awareness of what it’s like to be a young woman with cerebral palsy living in today’s society. When I upload a video to my YouTube channel, I feel a sense of empowerment. I get to make a difference in society and give people a positive perspective about cerebral palsy since society tends to only focus on the negative side of it.

Being a YouTuber helps me relieve my emotions about my condition and forget about the lack of mobility I have on the left side of my body. As I vlog about my every day life with cerebral palsy, I feel as though I am making an impact. I get to say “this is my story — take or leave it.” I’m proud of the person I am.

When I upload a YouTube video and receive a message about how my videos helped someone, that is truly what keeps me going. It gives me the motivation to continue to make an impact and leave my message in the world; to be that example for someone with cerebral palsy and to remind them to keep on going despite everything they might have to face in life.

Being a YouTuber has become one of the ways I’ve been able to cope with my disability and the world around me. It is very difficult living in a society where you have one of the most common disabilities, but it somehow seems to have very little awareness and general public understanding.

Being a YouTuber has made me more confident in myself. I can proudly stand behind the story I tell through the videos I upload and the messages behind them. I get to utilize YouTube as my platform to really tell the world that, “yes, I live with a disability. Yes, this is me and, no, I am not ashamed of being a person that lives with cerebral palsy.”

It also has allowed me to connect with others that are going through the same things that I’m going through. To know that I’m not alone in my journey is one of the greatest things I could ever ask for. Being able to connect with others via my YouTube has allowed me to build some of the most amazing friendships I would have never been able to make without the platform of YouTube.

Being a YouTuber with a disability has shown me that my story is needed. Despite everything I’ve gone through in my life, living with cerebral palsy, I am making an impact on the world and the way society views someone like me.

Photo credit: diego_cervo/Getty Images

Originally published: May 29, 2020
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