My six year old daughter, like most children, likes a bedtime story before she goes to sleep. Her latest favourite book is Goodnight Stories for Rebel Girls, a collection of stories about famous women who broke the mould in some way. There’s over a hundred of them: Coco Chanel, Jane Austen, Amelia Earhart to name a few. However, no matter what ones we read, she always insists on reading the story about Rosa Parks. It’s the story of a woman of colour who refused to give up her seat on the bus for a white person. Eventually, thanks to Rosa Parks, apartheid soon became illegal.

‘Why did black people and white people not sit together?’ my daughter asked, confused. There’s a healthy mixture of nationalities in her class, and my heart sunk at the idea that she would, unintentionally, start to label them as different.

‘Because people are mean,’ I replied. ‘Sometimes people make up stupid rules to suit themselves and hurt others, for no reason. It’s a bit like bullying.’

‘People are mean to you too, sometimes,’ she observed. ‘They laugh at you, call you names. But you never get hurt, and you never give out to them or get angry about it. If I were you, I would.’

I looked into her round blue eyes and smiled by way of reply. Plenty of time when she’s older, I thought, to sit her down and explain everything. How I grew up in a mainstream environment where I spent too much time trying to fit in. How I fought to prove myself as a person of worth, in school, in college and at work. How hard I’d fought to prove myself as a worthy mother, not only to professionals, but to Ali and even to myself.

Tomorrow, the 8th March marks International Women’s Day, a day to acknowledge and address both the real challenges facing modern women and the fantastic achievements that women have made throughout history.

But today, 7th March 2018, marks an equally significant milestone: a solid commitment from our government to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (aka the UNCRPD). The disabled population of Ireland has been waiting for this for nearly twelve years. And it seems inappropriate of me to admit that after all this time, after blogging about it so much, I don’t feel that lightness, that relief that I thought I would.

Oh, it’s a victory for sure – we have won a battle, all right – a battle we should never had to fight in the first place. The onset of the recession brought waves of devastation to the disability sector, and the aftershocks are still in evidence today. The disability budget was stripped down to the minimum, and many disabled people lived basic lives. Unable to afford their own accommodation or to get a job, many were forced to live with their families or in segregated/institutionalised settings. Fear soon consumed us, and many of us were left afraid to complain lest whatever we had left was taken away from us too.

I have spent my adult life hearing stories about wheelchair users being trapped on trains, about disabled parents living in fear of their kids being taken (and sadly I’ve also heard stories of people who’d love to become parents but don’t have the energy to fight the system/jump through hoops as we did), about people going for countless job interviews and never getting a job.  And as much as I’d love to think it would, ratifying the UNCRPD isn’t going to mean anything unless we truly believe  that we are equal and that we are willing to start a new narrative.

Tomorrow, on the 8th March, International Women’s Day, I will be thinking of all the wonderful rebel women I know, especially those with disabilities. The ones who fought to be educated. The ones who decided that they didn’t want to spend the rest of their lives in the back room of their parents’ houses. The ones who had lots of sex and had babies. The ones who continue chipping away at the inequality they face, both as women and disabled people. I’ll be thinking of my mother, who didn’t believe in mollycoddling me, who taught me how to be self-sufficient. I’ll be thinking of my daughter, the future generation, who I know will take it upon herself to make the world a better place for the rebel girls of the future.

And tomorrow, I’ll continue to lead by example, as best I can.