Empowering Lives
The Significance of Community Access for Individuals with Disabilities
What is an invisible disability?
Imagine having a disability but being called a faker, or lazy because people couldn’t ‘see’ it.
Here are five things about invisible disabilities you need to know.
Invisible disabilities are not rare
Nope, they’re really not. Millions of Australians live with a disability – and a surprising 90% of these people have what’s called an invisible disability.
As the name suggests, invisible disabilities aren’t easy to spot and you can’t ‘tell’ they have a disability just by looking at them.
But there are many disabilities and conditions that are counted as ‘invisible’, such as MS, autism, ADHD, arthritis, brain injuries, mental illnesses, diabetes, epilepsy, cognitive and learning disabilities, chronic pain and fatigue… and the list goes on.
Some invisible disabilities will become more obvious once you get to know a person a bit better, but many may be completely hidden unless the person chooses to tell you.
Some of your fave celebs have an invisible disability
Did you know that some of the biggest stars that we all love and admire have invisible illnesses and disabilities?
Here are just a few examples: Selena Gomez has Lupus, Jack Osbourne has MS, Demi Lovato has bipolar disorder, Little Wayne has epilepsy, Morgan Freeman has a chronic pain condition (fibromyalgia), Richard Gere and Ben Stiller have had Lyme Disease, Halle Berry has diabetes, and Amanda Seyfried has anxiety.
One thing’s for sure: this hasn’t stopped any of these people from carving out a successful career in their chosen fields. The best bit: they have chosen to speak openly about their conditions, helping to raise awareness and combat stigma around invisible illness and disability.
People with invisible disabilities are not ‘faking it’
This one’s really important – because unfortunately people with invisible disabilities are often accused of faking or imagining their symptoms – the phrases “but you don’t look sick” or “you don’t look like you have a disability” are said far too often!
Imagine having a very real diagnosis, and being unable to convince people that you’re not just a ‘hypochondriac’, or ‘being lazy’? Wouldn’t be nice would it. For these people, being met with scepticism that they’re legit is one of the hardest things of all.
And what makes this worse, is it actually also stops people from talking about their disability or downplaying their own experiences – which just perpetuates the invisibility and stigma even more!
So while it can be very easy to think, ‘I had something similar and I just got over it’ or ‘it can’t be that bad’, remember there can be a lot more to what’s going on than meets the eye.
Accessible toilets are not just for people who use a wheelchair
There are actually so many reasons why someone who doesn’t ‘look like they have a disability‘ might need to use the accessible toilet – and they shouldn’t be given death stares for doing so, or feel like they need to explain themselves.
For example, maybe they have a colostomy bag (where bowel motions are collected in a disposable bag) and need the extra space and running water. Maybe they have an inflammatory bowel disease, and are finding it difficult to hold on. Or maybe they have a disability that makes balancing tricky and they need to use hand rails.
Whatever the reason – all these people have the right to use the accessible amenities. So before you roll your eyes next time someone skips the bathroom queue for the accessible toilet, just remember that it’s not just those with physical disabilities who need these facilities.
Also remember, while it’s not illegal to use one an accessible toilet if you don’t have a disability, if you don’t need to use one, leave them free for those who do.
Same goes for accessible parking
While it’s illegal to park in an accessible parking space without a permit (and you’ll be up for a hefty fine if you do) some people have taken it upon themselves to become parking vigilantes.
The issue here is that these vigilantes think they’re doing the right thing by catching people out, but they often misread the situation – shaming those with invisible disabilities of cheating the system despite having an appropriate permit.
But there are so many reasons why someone might need a more accessible space than a wheelchair (think: prosthetic limb, breathing difficulties, mobility issues, etc).
So don’t try and police the parking spaces yourself – leave it up to those who are qualified to do so.
More Opportunities
We firmly believe that the internet should be available and accessible to anyone, and are committed to providing a website that is accessible to the widest possible audience, regardless of circumstance and ability.
To fulfill this, we aim to adhere as strictly as possible to the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 (WCAG 2.1) at the AA level. These guidelines explain how to make web content accessible to people with a wide array of disabilities. Complying with those guidelines helps us ensure that the website is accessible to all people: blind people, people with motor impairments, visual impairment, cognitive disabilities, and more.
This website utilizes various technologies that are meant to make it as accessible as possible at all times. We utilize an accessibility interface that allows persons with specific disabilities to adjust the website’s UI (user interface) and design it to their personal needs.
Additionally, the website utilizes an AI-based application that runs in the background and optimizes its accessibility level constantly. This application remediates the website’s HTML, adapts Its functionality and behavior for screen-readers used by the blind users, and for keyboard functions used by individuals with motor impairments.
If you’ve found a malfunction or have ideas for improvement, we’ll be happy to hear from you. You can reach out to the website’s operators by using the following email
Our website implements the ARIA attributes (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) technique, alongside various different behavioral changes, to ensure blind users visiting with screen-readers are able to read, comprehend, and enjoy the website’s functions. As soon as a user with a screen-reader enters your site, they immediately receive a prompt to enter the Screen-Reader Profile so they can browse and operate your site effectively. Here’s how our website covers some of the most important screen-reader requirements, alongside console screenshots of code examples:
Screen-reader optimization: we run a background process that learns the website’s components from top to bottom, to ensure ongoing compliance even when updating the website. In this process, we provide screen-readers with meaningful data using the ARIA set of attributes. For example, we provide accurate form labels; descriptions for actionable icons (social media icons, search icons, cart icons, etc.); validation guidance for form inputs; element roles such as buttons, menus, modal dialogues (popups), and others. Additionally, the background process scans all the website’s images and provides an accurate and meaningful image-object-recognition-based description as an ALT (alternate text) tag for images that are not described. It will also extract texts that are embedded within the image, using an OCR (optical character recognition) technology. To turn on screen-reader adjustments at any time, users need only to press the Alt+1 keyboard combination. Screen-reader users also get automatic announcements to turn the Screen-reader mode on as soon as they enter the website.
These adjustments are compatible with all popular screen readers, including JAWS and NVDA.
Keyboard navigation optimization: The background process also adjusts the website’s HTML, and adds various behaviors using JavaScript code to make the website operable by the keyboard. This includes the ability to navigate the website using the Tab and Shift+Tab keys, operate dropdowns with the arrow keys, close them with Esc, trigger buttons and links using the Enter key, navigate between radio and checkbox elements using the arrow keys, and fill them in with the Spacebar or Enter key.Additionally, keyboard users will find quick-navigation and content-skip menus, available at any time by clicking Alt+1, or as the first elements of the site while navigating with the keyboard. The background process also handles triggered popups by moving the keyboard focus towards them as soon as they appear, and not allow the focus drift outside it.
Users can also use shortcuts such as “M” (menus), “H” (headings), “F” (forms), “B” (buttons), and “G” (graphics) to jump to specific elements.
We aim to support the widest array of browsers and assistive technologies as possible, so our users can choose the best fitting tools for them, with as few limitations as possible. Therefore, we have worked very hard to be able to support all major systems that comprise over 95% of the user market share including Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Opera and Microsoft Edge, JAWS and NVDA (screen readers).
Despite our very best efforts to allow anybody to adjust the website to their needs. There may still be pages or sections that are not fully accessible, are in the process of becoming accessible, or are lacking an adequate technological solution to make them accessible. Still, we are continually improving our accessibility, adding, updating and improving its options and features, and developing and adopting new technologies. All this is meant to reach the optimal level of accessibility, following technological advancements. For any assistance, please reach out to