12 million people suffer from a disability in France. But did you know that among those people, 9 million suffer from a disability that other people do not notice? The figure on this fact is in fact quite exorbitant: 80% of declared disabilities are invisible. In today’s article, PlayMoovin’ wanted to put its focus on these diseases or invalidating syndromes, thus here is a non-exhaustive list of invisible disabilities.
What is an invisible disability?
The Fédération des Malades Handicapés (Disabled People Federation) defines an invisible disability as so: “An invisible disability is not apparent to others and is not always detectable if the person suffering from it remains silent about it because they fear other people’s judgment, stigmatisation, or even of being dismissed for inability. (…) Given the great diversity of invisible disabilities, plural must be used to talk about those kinds of situations. They can stem from a cognitive, sensory, or a psychological trouble or they can come from an invalidating disease (fibromyalgia, multiple sclerosis) and they can have huge consequences in the daily life of a person.”
An invisible disability is an alteration which is not necessarily seen contrary to a motor disability for instance.
Because there are no indicators, those close to the person suffering from an invisible disability often do not acknowledge it. Without visible signals, it is often hard to perceive and understand the disability.
Invisible disability: a list of invalidating health troubles
There are 4 types of troubles which are at the origin of an inviable disability.
Cognitive troubles: invisible disability list
Struggling to pay attention, to focus, to organise, to express oneself, etc.
Each of these troubles can be the consequence of an invalidating disease, like multiple sclerosis for example. There are other numerous diseases which cause these symptoms, here a few of them:
- A brain motor disability;
- Alzheimer;
- A stroke;
- SLD’s (Specific Learning Disability);
- Etc.
Invalidating chronic diseases
Invisible disabilities can be caused by many invalidating diseases such as:
- Parkinson;
- Diabetes;
- Respiratory diseases;
- Etc.
Troubles related to psychological disabilities
Psychological troubles are one of the 4 types of invisible disabilities. For example, depression is considered to be an invalidating health trouble. Other diseases of a psychological origin are causing invisible but very incapacitating symptoms such as:
- Paranoia;
- Bipolarity;
- General anxiety;
- OCD’s;
- Etc.
According to Agefiph, more than 600 000 people would suffer from this type of invisible disability in France.
Sensory disabilities
To end this list of invisible disabilities, we will talk about sensory deficiencies. Whether the sense loss is total or partial, visual deficiency and deafness are often very invalidating. Despite that, it can go completely unnoticed by others.
Deafness, sight and memory problems are likely to cause difficulties related to an invisible disability. Autism spectre disorder has an impact on communication.
Invisible disability: symptoms examples
Naturally, the symptoms are inherent to the disease or the disability. But on top of that, the person suffering from an invisible disability can develop a particular interaction with the things around them. For instance, his disease can cause chronic fatigue that even resting will struggle to appease. It also sometimes create emotional exacerbation in the form of:
- A burst of anger;
- A state of apparent nonchalance;
- Etc.
Chronic pain can also happen as a consequence of an injury, a disease, a surgery, etc.
Invisible disability and discriminations
Some people who suffer from a disability still suffer from discriminations as of today. The INSEE (national institute for statistics and economic studies) considers there are more than 3 million disabled people in this case. They are isolated and they suffer.
Teasings, unjust treatments or even sometimes insults are part of these people’s daily life. It is therefore urgent to raise awareness of visible and invisible disabilities among the most amount of people.
Acknowledgment of invisible disabilities is a major difficulty for people who suffer from it. These people can feel misunderstood and be mentally affected by it.
It must be known that a worker is acknowledged of suffering from an invisible disability by the Departemental House for Disabled People (MDPH). Recognition of disabled worker status (RQTH) allows them to benefit from specific aids.
Invisible disability: how to fight against discriminations?
What if we let go of the prejudices to end discriminations towards disabled people? This is why we decided to do at PlayMoovin’. Our goal is to change the way able-bodied view visible and invisible disabilities by organising activities to raise awareness of disabilities through sport among many types of audiences.
To help us reach this goal, we have conceived a validated light sport wheelchair with unmatched solidity: the FreeMoovin’. It is used with children of every age during awareness sessions. It is also used in companies so that all collaborators can become aware of what a disabled person goes through.
We have here established a non-exhaustive list of invisible disabilities. Today, if some are acknowledged, many remain misunderstood by the general public. PlayMoovin’ wishes to demystify disabilities so if you also want things to change, join us so we can fight together against discriminations!
