A wild child in her teens – now a zen TV star, Tiphany Adams is a drop-dead gorgeous paraplegic who’s been aiming to change the world since being injured in a car accident at the age of 17.
She wants to change the way the way the world looks at people with disabilities and she wants to use media to make that happen. Read this entry
In episode 13, Mia swims her first meet (and it’s against all able-bodied swimmers), Auti and Eric finally get some deep conversations going on having kids and Tiphany rolls a 5k. And you gotta watch Tiph do her faux chair “run” in Angela’s kitchen.
And good news! Push Girls has been renewed for a second season! (look for it in 2013)
SPOILERS AHEAD ***
The episode begins by checking in with Mia at the pool, whose doing her last practice before her swim meet, and we get another melodramatic over dub of Mia’s story, and she talks about how hard it was to not be able to swim anymore (and now she’s worried about failing).
Her trainer Kevin, who trained several Paralympic athletes, has her doing different turns in the water. He tells the camera she needs to get over her emotional blocks if she wants to succeed.
After she gets out of the pool, she tells him how slow she feels when she’s swimming, which I’m sure is a big change from how it felt before. “I’m still so far from the level I used to be at,” she says. “The meet is only a few days away, but I really don’t feel ready.”
Oooh baby. I woke up this morning thinking I had nothing to look forward to except an ultrasound and a day of writing ahead of me, but then I saw the first episode of Push Girls dropped a week early. Post-Memorial Day weekend blues cured.
SPOILERS AHEAD ***
The first episode is titled “Everyone Stares,” which couldn’t be a better name for the first episode (that’s one of the first things you’ll notice when you use a wheelchair – everybody stares).
And as the 12 minute preview (released last month) of the series gave me hope for, the first episode hit every note – the reality of dating in a wheelchair, health issues (that can come up at the worst times), and grief…dealing with the loss of mobility, which even the bling and fancy cars can’t fix.
I think one of the things a lot of people with disabilities were worried about when they first heard about the show was that it wouldn’t portray the reality of life in a wheelchair; that the girls might too pretty, too rich, that they had above average support from family and friends (or all of the above), and so they were not going to support it; but from what I saw in episode one however was a very accurate portrayal. Their lives are not rainbows and sunshine bubbles.
A new reality show “Push Girls,” featuring four female wheelchair-users, has been green-lighted by the Sundance Channel. The show will change misconceptions of disability and so much more.
