Hello! It's another video from the floor.
If you don't know me, my name's Jessica. I'm a disabled YouTuber and I also have a condition called POTS,
which you can learn more about in the card above.
Basically means that I spend a lot of time lying on the floor.
So I thought I'd share some information about some of my other wonderful, friendly, disabled YouTubers
and I was inspired to make this video by Annie Elainey who has a part one on her channel
that I loved, and I'm doing part two today
and part three, she is releasing at the same time as this video
so you can go and watch that for more lovely disabled YouTubers.
But first, I'm going to tell you about one of the things that I do
the most, whilst I am lying on the floor
and this video today is sponsored by the game Best Fiends.
Like friends, see? Disabled friends.
Best Fiends. It works, there's a link. There's a link, guys, OK?
I love playing games on my phone
while I'm lying on the floor and I'm really not able to function and do much else
because it makes me feel like I have accomplished.
And I actually really love Best Fiends.
They contacted me, I had a look at the game, and I was like [excited gasp].
"Yes! This is exactly the kind of thing I love!"
It's puzzles;
it's logic.
It's a bit like Candy Crush, but I'm already on level six-hundred-and-something
of Candy Crush and it's got boring.
But I really enjoy Best Fiends
because there's a lot of logic.
You've got to really think about all of the moves that you make.
So it's a puzzle adventure game.
You go through the levels; matching up colours to win things.
You've got coins; you've got little diamonds. You've got these weird little squishy things, they are adorable.
And you find fiends, and together you defeat the slugs.
If you played the Zoombinis, you're really going to like this game.
You can also play it without Wi-Fi, so if you're on a long journey...
Perfect.
This month, you can play the special Valentine's Day quest
where you can win wonderful, beautiful little prizes,
including a very rare rose orchid mantis.
You can download the game for free
using the link down below in the description
and if you follow that link you will get five dollar's worth of free gold and diamonds.
I'll be honest: I would be playing this game whether they were sponsoring me or not.
So, I just really like it.
See, everyone says that I should not use plastic straws
and I understand that, I understand that: environmental reasons
but these are the only straws that bend.
And I wash them in the dishwasher and re-use them
over and over again.
Daily, so I think it's fine.
Although, otherwise, if I'm sitting up, I do use my metal straws, don't I?
Annie Elainey
So the first person I'm going to be talking about is the lovely Annie
whose video is being released at exactly the same time as this one
so you can go over and watch it on her channel.
Annie is an amazing chronically ill writer,
blogger, Vlogger, and activist.
Annie makes weekly videos about the world through her eyes:
The eyes of a disabled, queer,
Latinx... Is that how you say that?
So creative, and her videos touch on a range of topics,
such as race,
body image, and gender as well.
I'm a really big fan of her Twitter, because...I think it's just so interesting and educational
and she's very vocal on Twitter about issues and the people that she supports,
and I really love that. I'm a really big fan.
If you watch my channel because you feel like you learn a lot from it,
then definitely go and follow Annie, because you will certainly learn a lot from her.
I know I have.
Nikki Lilly
Nikki and I were on the disabilities panel at Summer in the City last year
- 2017 - which, by the way, if you want me to go this year, you've got to Tweet them and let them know
if you wanna come and meet me.
Nikki is so amazing and so young, I am completely blown away by her talent.
She's only thirteen, but she runs an amazing channel;
bakes fabulous cakes, and is part of CBBC.
Which is the children's BBC channel, for anyone who is not a Brit.
Nikki has an AVM,
which is an arteriovenous--
it's a really rare condition that's characterised by an abnormal connection between veins and arteries.
Hers manifests on her face, but it can develop in other body parts, as well.
Nikki is one of the sweetest people I've ever met, and she really has the same 'can do' sort of attitude as me;
she likes to focus on the positive as well.
You should follow her for really like pretty make-up
and baking; happiness, along with some really cute games that she plays with her siblings, as well.
Hannah Hodgson
Hannah's part of BookTube and she uses her channel to talk about her views on books;
the things that she likes,
but also to talk about her health struggles.
We have POTS in common, so yay! But...also not yay.
Not yay.
I really like the way that Hannah explains so clearly and so elegantly
the struggles of living with intestinal failure and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome
and she really shares tips and tricks for making the best out of life,
and I really--I really like that about her.
Also, she writes her own poetry and she has won some national awards, which is pretty fancy!
She's a really fab person, and since her channel isn't very big,
it's likely to get hit by YouTube's demonetisation of smaller creators.
So please, please, please, if anything I've just said about Hannah really interests you,
or you wanna go to her channel and check her out,
please do go and give her some support.
Annika Victoria
One of my favourite videos from last year was Annika Victoria's 'Get Ready With Me.'
She normally makes videos about seamster-y.
Seamster-y. It's a word.
With amazing DIYs.
I mean, I'm stunned by her DIYs.
I'm not sure how she turns something really ugly into something really beautiful.
Seemingly so easily.
Her sewing skills are absolutely amazing.
But in this video she instead talked about things that her audience don't necessarily see
and that's her life with Takayasu's arteritis.
Takayasu's arteritis - I really hope I said that correctly.
Takayasu's arteritis.
Despite having a life-threatening illness and a huge YouTube channel,
that she's doing amazingly with,
and displaying her beautiful creativity, she is also studying for her bachelor's in science.
Go and watch her make some fabulous art.
Oliver Lam-Watson
I met Oliver at a ball last year
and he was carrying possibly the most beaten up camera I have ever seen in my life.
He's training to be a Paralympic wheelchair fencer
and he is one of those people who runs into mud
for fun.
He's a fabulous human, but also...mud.
Why? Why the mud?
He does videos with travel, fitness,
and more recently he's started to make short films
that are really creative and I really enjoy watching.
Just about different aspects of his life.
Having a disability and
day-to-day things that maybe we don't always think about.
I really think he's going to go really far, especially with this new style of video that he's been doing.
So I think you should go and subscribe to him right now so you can say that you got in there early.
Krystal-Bella Shaw
Krystal is another lovely girl on the panel at me -
at me? with me -
at Summer in the City last year; the disabilities panel.
She talks about dyspraxia
and autism and other sort of neurological disabilities.
One thing that I really love about Krystal is that she advocates for disabled YouTubers and disabled people
off the platform, as well,
and she was, in fact, the whole reason that that panel came to be.
And she's always pushing to make YouTube more accessible.
Molly Burke
You've probably already heard of Molly. She is one of the biggest disabled creators on YouTube.
And she was also a featured YouTube creator, I believe
a month ago.
After starting to go blind at the age of four, she's been a motivational speaker since the age of five,
which is amazing.
She advocates for anti-bullying, accessibility,
and is a global face for Dove.
Gem from WHEELSNOHEELS
You may remember Gem from our collaboration a few months ago.
She had a spinal cord injury when she was a young girl
and now on her channel she talks a lot about life with a wheelchair,
how you just get on with daily life;
she's got some amazing stuff, and she's started to focus also on parenting from a wheelchair
and parenting when you're disabled,
which I think is so great, because there's absolutely no one else out there like her.
No one is talking about these things.
And as someone who would like to have children
in the not-too-distant future,
it's stuff that I find really interesting and really enjoyable and inspirational.
And she's given me a lot of tips, I have to say.
She also has amazing hair.
It's really long and beautiful
and she does some great stuff with it.
And so if you like my hair tutorials,
you should go and check out Gem's as well, and her Instagram,
where she does cute little hair tutorial videos, as well.
Kat from KATZCLAWS
Kat is a twenty-year-old vlogger and activist.
She's from Yorkshire. Yay!
British people.
Everyone's British, I don't know what I'm talking about.
Kat has spinal muscular atrophy
and on her channel she talks about a whole range of different stuff
to do with her life, whether that's having carers; getting from place to place;
how it feels to be at big events, where there are lots of other people.
But she also has some beautiful make-up. She's got really good make-up.
And amazing-coloured hair.
Just, her hair is amazing.
I just...
It's the type of--I met her in person and I think I couldn't stop staring at her hair.
It was so good.
And one thing that's super special about Kat is that she was part of boohoo's #allgirls campaign.
And I'm really, really proud of her for that, 'cause she did amazingly.
Megan Bacon-Evans from WHAT WEGAN DID [NEXT]
And the last person that I'm going to mention is the absolutely lovely Megan
who I did a collaboration with just last week!
I didn't... It was filmed in January and we lost all the footage, and then she really kindly let me have--Anyway.
Enough of the broken...technology drama; it's been remedied now.
Due to medical negligence when she was a baby,
Megan's grown up having a shorter arm, which she calls Handy.
She's amazing.
Apparently, most people who have a shortened arm have a name for it.
I did not know that, but that seems absolutely amazing.
Please, if you are someone who has a special name for your arm, I would love to know about this.
Megan's channel is largely with her wife Whitney.
They fell in love through the internet.
Megan's English and Whitney's American
and they came together to create Wegan, and I've been following them for many, many years.
I was fangirling quite a bit when we met. It was a thing. It was a thing.
But Megan now has started to open up about living with a disability as well and
talk about what that is like.
And! not only that, but as we mentioned in our collaboration videos -
again, which we did last week -
we are going to be co-launching some merch.
Amazing!
It's so exciting. I have no merch. I've never done this before.
Which will have "#disGabled" written on it.
Disabled and gay.
It's a niche, but it's a big niche.
K? It's a big niche.
Did you know one third of gay people have a disability?
And - sorry - when I use "gay," I do mean LGBTQ+
So, make sure that you're following both of us on Twitter for all of the details about that;
I will be updating you as soon as I have news
but it shouldn't be too long now.
So please go and check out some of these absolutely amazing humans and their YouTube channels.
Show them some love.
Share your joy with the world
and share them with your friends.
Share this video with your friends!
And a special thank you to Best Fiends
for this game
and bringing this into my life.
[Pleased sigh]
This is where I'll be for the next few days.
If you're wondering where I am,
you know where to find me.