Oberlin is certainly feeling the effects of the fall semester finals period, an agony characterised by stress, nausea, and that virus we’ve all somehow had since late October, but the disabled students on campus are a special kind of damned. Earlier this year, Oberlin’s Division of Student Affairs stated that “more than 25 percent of Oberlin students are registered with [the] ODA,” and on average, half of a given disabled student population won’t register with their school’s office of accommodations, so that high statistic is still conservative. Disabled students will consistently feel the pressure of this time of year more than non-disabled, but due to stigma, disbelief, and a general unwillingness to normalize disability, the odds that they have the words to describe that burden — or even know why it’s there — are low. Luckily, the spoon theory exists to aid us in effectively communicating and understanding ourselves as people with disabilities.
The term spoon theory was coined in 2003 by Christine Miserandino, a chronically ill blogger providing first-hand accounts of living with a disability invisible to the naked eye, and has since been adopted by the entire disability community. The theory posits that people begin each day with a finite number of spoons, representative of physical and emotional energy, and that disabled people consistently have less spoons than non-disabled. Consequently, spoons must be rationed, which is to say that each action must be premeditated. While non-disabled people usually have enough spoons to avoid worrying about rationing, that might not be true this time of year. This is for a few reasons — finals are an obvious one, the quantity of work is exhausting alone, a feeling aided by illnesses running rampant in winter. The weather weakens resistance to viruses, and all the time spent indoors allows sicknesses to efficiently spread. Winter-pattern Seasonal Affective Disorder, aptly shortened to SAD, can also incite feelings of hopelessness, emptiness, anxiety, fatigue, and brain fog, as well as physical symptoms such as digestive problems and headaches, or distinct changes in sleep and eating patterns. The frequent vacations also often lead to losing steam, and if you’re a new college student, the adrenaline of being here has recently worn off. Every element is another stressor sucking spoons into an abyss, so for this short period of time, non-disabled people may very slightly understand what disabled people feel constantly. But it’ll never be as debilitating. For non-disabled people, there’s a distinct, predictable, transactional connection between doing things and losing spoons. Losing spoons with a disability is akin to losing one sock from a pair every time you do laundry, or an entire 20-count pack of hair ties in less than a month. It’s quick, unpredictable, and often unnamable. This is not abnormal, and this is not due to any individual flaw or fault.
There’s a common belief that disabled people, including people with mental illnesses, can’t balance various aspects of our lives because of an inability to do most things a non-disabled person can — something disability theorists often call an “expectation of deficiency.” Executive dysfunction is a real issue, but it only applies to a handful of the disabled community. I’ve come to learn that the multiplicity of tasks is often much more of an issue than the actual tasks themselves. Not to mix cutlery metaphors, but when there are multiple spinning plates, they simply can’t be kept up out of sudden necessity. We find ourselves going to class but cancelling social plans, or showering regularly but having to wear the same dirty laundry for days, sacrificing sources of fulfillment due to a genuine inability to participate in all of them. Though it’s difficult to accept, that inability typically isn’t one that can be unlearned or overcome — but it is something we can talk about. The lack of conversation and constant shame that comes with the disabled identity so frequently prohibits us from living happily, but there are perspectives that help create a more rounded life, and none of them include viewing disability as an insurmountable obstacle. Though having limited spoons is taxing and frustrating, the awareness it necessitates is an asset. My advice is not “don’t worry, be happy,” or to push away any feelings of inadequacy and continue trucking along. Instead, listen to your self-informing cues. Learn what you can and can’t do, how far you can push yourself, and what you can handle to gain a fuller understanding of your wants, needs, and abilities, then set your priorities accordingly. A lack of spoons isn’t something we can fix, but through starting to shirk the shame and having the words to openly discuss it, we can learn what we need and start to shape our behaviors around it. A disabled person’s understanding of themself is their greatest asset, so pay attention to your limits and give yourself grace.
