Self-control

So I'm just curious. What situations do you guys find yourself in constantly that annoy you and make you yet due to professional or personal obligations you just grin and bear it? For instance, myself being the active motherfucker in wheelchair sports I am, I hear these two things often.
1) "So you compete in Special Olympics then?"
2) "Oh thats so great you do that"/"You're so inspirational"
Now let me point out my dilemma with these two statements.
1) Special Olympics everyone competes and everyone gets a medal. I worked my ass off all year 6 days a week from 10th grade through college senior year...and what do i have to show for it? Not a damn thing. Honestly? because i didnt make the cut. I'm not taking away from Special Olympics: it has its purpose. But what i do is for the top echelon, the pro athletes of the disabled world. Also, i have a college degree and was one of the tops in my class in high school. Since when was the brain located in my legs? Its paralympics not special olympics folks. Now usually when i hear this one i feel my fist clinch as my brain searches for the most obvious shortcoming of the person to attack...and bam the conscience kicks in. I politely correct them and say "well no <insert sir or maam dependent on gender> thats more for mentally handicapped people what i do. What i do is called the paralympics.
2)How is me going out to work out any different from the millions worldwide who workout every day? (be it on purpose or through their life styles) Im just a normal 22 year old. Nothing more nothing less. You know who's more inspirational than me? Pretty much anybody. I have no job and live at home with my parents playing way too much Warcrack. This is a good thing now?

Or even better when I'm at lets say...the mall or the grocery store due to lack of anything better do
"Oh its so good you're out"
What? I"m not supposed to eat or buy things cuz i dont have legs? hell cripples gotta be entertained and eat too. The best is when I play DDR at the arcade. Freaks people the hell out (once had a crowd at disney land). Me being out is no different than anyone else being out.

Yet like I said at the beginning of the topic: its all about self control. This is a theread where you show self control in real life but can vent here. fuck that this is the internet. Live the international dream! Spit on your boss and shit on his desk when he tells you you gotta work on sunday and your tps report was missing a cover, Play his head like a bongo drum on the way out! What do you want to do in these situations you find?



P.S. Doobie: you inspired this thread but im not mad about the statements: it just got my brain rolling at 3 AM....

Didn't mean to inspire this thread I just thought it was great you lead a normal lifestyle. I know A lot of people that are wasting there lives away for no reason and you make no excuses to live your life. You are normal and I see that, gosh I feel kind of stupid now.

Maybe people say these things because to them, you're an inspiration. I know if I lost my legs, I'd be heartbroken. These people feel empathy for you. That's not a bad thing. Would you rather them make fun of you?

Seems to me that Gonzo is just a jerk.

Looks like that you just want to be treated like any normal person and not given any special treatment. [/psychoanalytical babble]

Maybe people say these things because to them, you're an inspiration. I know if I lost my legs, I'd be heartbroken. These people feel empathy for you. That's not a bad thing. Would you rather them make fun of you?

thats just the thing matthew: its not like i lost them ive never walked. I dont know what walking feels like, so i have nothing to miss. hell i cant even tie a shoe

So.... Uhh..... Does this mean that you'll still compete in the special olympics then?

i guess im done here..i was just curious what other people run into

Self-control was the name of the game in my old job as an ISP support tech, especially since it's a small company and we didn't have seperate technical/accounts departments so you'd not only end up dealing with computer illiterate customers who wouldn't follow instructions and had difficulty understanding terms like "bottom left" but you had to deal with irate customers who had complaints about their bills and felt they shouldn't be disconnected even though they hadn't paid their bill for two months.

One of the reasons I was to looking to leave around the time they made me redundant was that the job was becoming really stressful. I've heard that you can really only last up to two years in help desk and since a small company doesn't offer many opportunities for advancement, I'd been in the same job (with minimal wage increases) for three years and had also taken over for the office admin when she left so I was beginning to get burned out on it. I would say that the job is deceptively stressful. When you start out, there's actually a bit of fun in the challenge of figuring out someone's problems and helping them solve them and it feels rewarding but when you deal with the same problems day-in, day-out and encounter your fair share of people who are difficult to deal with one way or another, it becomes a frustrating experience. In that particular job, there were also some other issues that led to my dissatisfaction which made self-control all the more difficult as I was growing increasingly unhappy there but you've just got to keep your cool.

Gonzo, don't worry, you're not special. And if anyone thinks you are special, I'll make sure they change their minds.