G: You could yawn.
J: Maybe I'm missing something here. Maybe this is what I should be doing.
G: Yeah, get the blood going.
G: And then, "Wheeeeee!"
J: I don't know what I'm doing now.
G: You learnt this at Channel 4.
J: Hi, lovelies! So, I'm joined today by the lovely Gem.
J: Who has an amazing Instagram account called Wheels No Heels, which you should definitely check out
and I'm going to put a link to in the description.
J: Yeah!
J: And we've also made a video that is on her channel
which is also linked in the description, so you can go and check that out!
J: Hello.
J: And have rather--I don't know what your dog's called!
G: Bindy.
J: Bindy! Hi, Bindy.
J: So, I talked in my video about being disabled in school
and what that was like for me.
A little bit about friendships.
J: And when we met up, we had a really nice chat about friendships
and what happens when you become disabled.
G: So, I had heart surgery when I was nine
I had a coarctation repair on the aorta,
and as I was coming round from the anaesthetic, the stitches burst
and I had major internal bleeding and
the surgeons had to do the surgery there and then on PICU
and they managed to get my heart re-started
but I was without oxygen for over ten minutes, which is pretty dangerous!
J: Yep.
G: And they really didn't know what state I was going to be in that I was in an induced coma
for a couple of weeks.
G: And eventually I came round, I couldn't see.
I couldn't move.
But just through pure determination,
and day-by-day and intense physiotherapy,
I've got to the point where I am now.
So I've actually suffered a T10 incomplete spinal cord injury,
so I use a wheelchair to get around from A to B,
but I think I've done pretty well.
J: I would say so!
J: One of my favourite things about you is you're really chirpy, like me.
J: It's just like, "Yes, this big thing happened; it was really bad, but..."
G: We got on.
"I did pretty well, yeah."
G: Yeah. You know, my mum watched one of your videos and she was like, "That was just like watching Gem!"
G: That happened when I was nine.
G: Yeah, I went back to my original school,
which was a massive school.
It was very boisterous; a lot of boys there.
It was very big.
And then my parents decided that it would be good to go to a quieter school
which I--I agreed with, too,
J: Yeah.
G: And we went to a convent.
An all girl's convent! Now have I got some stories.
J: When I was a kid, I did consider that I wanted to be a nun when I grew up
but then I realised that was just because I was a lesbian.
J: But you were only nine.
I was...seventeen when I became really badly ill.
G: Yeah.
J: And then I was in hospital for two years.
J: I think it's a whole different...friend thing, isn't it, when you're seventeen?
J: Everyone's got raging hormones, for one thing.
J: You miss two parties, you don't get invited to the third party, that's it.
G: You were lucky! If you missed one, you didn't get invited to the next one.
J: And I had friends who - you know, there was one particular boy I was BEST friends with -
but after this happened to me, if I went up to him,
even if he was in a group of other people--I'd wheel up,
'In my wheelchair, hello!'
And, um, he would sort of look at me
and then he'd just walk away.
J: "Mmm, great."
J: And just kind of that isolation was absolutely...heartbreaking
and ridiculous and...
G: You know we were saying that people, they either have it or they DON'T have it?
J: Yeah.
J: Gumption.
G: Yeah, like, some friends will just be absolutely amazing
and will just be like, "Yep, let's just go for it, let's just do it."
G: And you'll meet people, and they will have it
and then you'll meet other people who just have absolutely no idea.
J: I think that was part of the problem with being--when I was a teenager,
and that most of my friends had no idea.
They'd never met a disabled person
in any sense.
So, I started going deaf and they didn't know anyone who was deaf,
so that was a thing.
And then I had mobility problems and they didn't know anyone who had mobility problems,
so THAT was a thing
and then I had energy problems and they didn't know anyone with energy problems,
so I was just this whole ball of weirdness that they just couldn't cope with
and it was much easier to just drop it.
To just drop me.
There were some people in my life who had been friends of friends.
These were the people who, suddenly, were absolutely amazing.
And there were two of them. One has a mother who's got MS and one has a mother who's got ME.
J: And they were just...there.
"How can we help you?"
J: They saw how sad I was and they were--they just treated me like a human being.
G: Mmm.
J: Suddenly! I was like, "Oh, my gosh, someone's being really nice to me."
J: You know, one of them - he's very "hench"
(I think is the appropriate term)
- he's very muscled.
So, he would just scoop me up and carry me around places, because it was just easier.
G: Yeah, I had some friends like that. Yeah.
J: It was just kind of like, "I want to go there." "OK."
G: Yeah.
J: Here we go.
J: No big deal.
J: Or, the other one, we went to go and stay with some friends,
and I'd been so upset and thought that there was no way I could do this by myself.
I couldn't get there;
I couldn't look after myself. I was like, "Oh, my mum's got to come, I hate it."
J: And she was like, "Don't worry, I'M gonna be there!
And she completely took over my care.
G: That's amazing.
J: She helped me get dressed every morning; she helped me take my clothes off at night.
She fed me if I needed feeding, because my hands weren't working.
J: Oh, this is a time when my arms were paralysed.
J: And it's amazing because these are the people that I think it's just within them.
G: Yeah.
J: to be amazingly good people.
G: Yeah, exactly.
J: And they almost look around like, "Why won't anyone else do this?"
G: Yeah, it's having the X factor, isn't it?
J: Yes.
G: They've just "got it," you know, like I was just saying.
They've either got it or they haven't,
and I can literally count, maybe on one hand, the people I know that have it.
G: I sometimes feel like I should tell these people that they've got it.
G: But I don't know, that might be a bit weird; they might not know what I'm talking about
J: So, it's kind of understandably difficult,
I think, if someone you know; someone in your social group; maybe even someone at school,
has developed a disability or become ill.
You know, sometimes there are kids who get cancer in your class in school,
and how do you react?
Often, people say nothing
G: Yeah.
J: and avoid that person and don't talk to them, because it's so awkward.
J: So, here are our ideas of some tips that you can put into place if someone in your life has become disabled.
G: I would say: treat them as you treated them before.
They are still that person.
G: Don't be scared of the aids that they might be using.
I think people become very scared of a wheelchair;
they might be scared to all of a sudden see a hearing aid because they haven't seen it before
or even like a prosthetic, or anything like that
because when you don't see something in your every day life, it can be a bit scary, can't it?
J: Yeah, something very new.
G: But I think you just need to normalise it.
They're still your friend. Remember why you're friends with them in the first place.
They're still that person.
You need to be there for them; you need to give them the support they need.
G: I think they kind of need to come to you, in a way, as well
and...listen to them, and think ahead sometimes about what obstacles might be coming up.
G: You know, if you're going down one route that you always used to take at school and they've got stairs,
think, "Hang on a minute, let's go this way" to try and make them feel more comfortable.
Even maybe making a little joke out of something.
"Oh, hang on, we can't go this way!"
"You're gonna make yourself in a worse situation. Let's go this way!"
G: And it kind of normalises the situation; everybody feels comfortable with it.
It's like breaking the ice, isn't it?
J: Yeah. I'd rather people mention it than just completely ignore the fact.
Like if I'm in a wheelchair and I see someone, and last time they saw me I wasn't in a wheelchair,
and they don't say anything, I almost feel like,
"Are you gonna mention something now? I'm your crotch height and you're just gonna breeze on by? OK."
"Fine."
With your friend - whether they've become ill; whether they've become disabled -
don't just talk about nothing
or talk about every day stuff;
let them know that they can vent to you
because that was what I really wanted: I really wanted to be able to sit down
and be like, "You know what? This has happened and it's really awful
and I'm gonna get really mad about it...but now let's talk about Made in Chelsea."
J: Boundaries--this sounds a bit weird, but boundaries:
know your friend; know their boundaries
One of my amazing friends that I was talking about earlier
- the one who used to carry me around everywhere -
G [loudly]: With THE X FACTOR!
J: he also used to call me The Cripple, or The Crip
but, like, it was in quite a funny way.
G: You don't mind that?
J: I didn't from HIM.
G: OK...
J: If someone else did it, I'd be like, "I will smack you."
J: But he's doing it in an ironic way.
G: Mmm. That is a careful--yeah.
J: So...know your friendship.
G: Yes.
J: If you're close like that, and you joked that way before they became disabled,
continue joking.
J: You know, if you made fun of the fact that he had ginger hair before
G: Oh, yeah!
J: now continue to make fun of the fact that they're in a wheelchair.
J: It's cool. It's just a part of them now, you know?
G: Yeah--yeah, but you've got to feel within yourself that that is...
J: Don't fence it off like it's a special topic,
but if you've never joked with your friend like that before, don't start doing it now!
G: No, no, no.
J: No!
G: No, no, no.
G: I had someone at work say, "Come along, hop along!"
It's like, dude, that's not OK.
J: No.
G: That is not OK.
J: I will smack you.
J: I used to drive my wheelchair into people's ankles.
G: "Oh, sorry, didn't see you there!"
J: I was like, "If you're gonna ignore me--you're gonna ignore me because I'm now in a wheelchair? Wow."
J: "I wanna see you ignore the pain in your ankles."
G: "Ignore this."
G: I remember - quite vividly - when I came out of hospital,
I was laying on the sofa as a nine-year-old,
and all my friends came to visit me.
J: Aww.
G: Yeah, SOUNDS nice.
G: And they were so scared, and they just stood in the lounge and stared at me
and my mum sort of had to...kind of usher them away.
G: That's all I really remember of it, I was quite ill.
G: But, yeah, it was pretty horrendous.
J: Don't stare. There's one thing.
G: Don't just...stare!
J: In kind of contrast to that, on one of the first weekends I was allowed out of hospital,
my primary school friends, who - we had this little gang
(still do) (Hi, guys!) -
G: Aww.
J: and they came over to see me, and I was, at the time
- I feel like I have to put a vomit warning on every video, but: vomit warning -
I was constantly vomiting;
I mean non-stop, so I was getting really dehydrated because I couldn't stop vomiting,
but I was allowed home for the weekend,
and they came in and they just sat and chatted to me as if this was NOT happening!
G: Wow.
J: Like, we just talked about life and clothes and
er, I think two of them had boyfriends at the time, so there was like boyfriend drama.
"Totally awful, I really think you should dump him.
I mean, that time that you went to that..." [mimics vomiting]
J: And they were just so fine with it. I just thought, "You people are amazing. I love you so much."
J: And then we had a discussion about getting married
and they were like, "You'll definitely be the first one to get married!"
And I was like, "I spent a month unable to stop vomiting.
I feel so unattractive right now."
J: But the fact that they thought that about me
just meant the world to me.
J: Just right up to the time I got married.
G: Aww.
J: The first one to get married.
J: It made me happy. Because I was like, "They believed in me."
J: So what do you guys think? What are your top tips, would you say, for someone dealing with
a friend or an acquaintance, or even a family member,
who has developed a disability or an illness?
What works? What worked for you if that was you in that position?
J: Let us know down below in the comments.
J: Also, 'Like' this video if you've really enjoyed it
- yay! - and make sure you go and check out Gem's channel
G: Yes. I'm over there right now.
J: which is really cool.
J: And she does really cool hair stuff.
J: Like braids, that I cannot do.
G: Oh! We'll have a lesson.
J: You should braid my hair!
G: Yes, I can braid your hair.
J: I'll curl your hair and you can braid my hair!
G: Yes!
J: It's so girly, this moment. I love it!