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| Oluwaseun Fadipe has spoken out about life with a disability |
A BRITISH TEEN suffering from a rare condition has spoken out about life with a disability in the UK.
Oluwaseun Fadipe, 19, suffers from cystic hygroma which is a a lymphatic malformation where fluid-filled sacs known as cysts collect on the body.
The bright teen has spoken out about his life in the UK by writing a blog, saying while he's not suffered physical abuse he has been the subject of verbal bullying.
The blog post reads: "I personally and thankfully have not had to deal with physical abuse from people, but I can relate to verbal abuse since I have suffered from it myself on a number of occasions.
"While I have learnt to deal with verbal abuse myself, this is obviously a major issue and I imagine that there may be people with a physical disability who may not be able to deal with the abuse as well."
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| The youngster has enjoyed life at school but has been subject to verbal abuse |
Oluwaseun hopes his blog invites others to come forward and share their own stories of overcoming adversity.
His condition has seen him undergo a string of operations and hospital stays, including a ten-month stint at London's Great Ormond Street Hospital when he was a child.
Despite suffering from pain in his face, having a speech impairment and being fed via a tube, the determined teenager says he tries not to let it affect his day to day life.
"I regularly have appointments for various things but I haven't had a lot of surgery in recent times," he said.
"Maybe in the future more surgery would be an option, but right now I'm happy with the way things are going and want to focus on living my life and getting my education."
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| Oluwaseun went through a ten-month stint at London's Great Ormond Street Hospital |
He has already worked with an Australian teenager called Hope who, like him, suffers from cystic hygroma, and talked about overcoming her fear of what others thought of her to land her first ever job.
"If I could say anything to people out there who are struggling with feeling held back by a disability it would be this – never give up on yourself," he said.
"It doesn't matter if you may not be able to do some things, you might excel at something else.
"If you work hard, everything else will fall into place."
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| Using his past as a lesson, Oluwaseun is encouraging people with disabilities to speak out |
But it's not all struggle and strife for the youngster, who has been accepted to study computer games software development at Southampton Solent University.
He said: "The plan for the blog is for me to share my stories, views and experiences with other people, and for other people to share theirs with me.
"It's important for the public to get to know what disabled people are really like and it's a great opportunity for us to inspire each other.
"I want to show everyone they shouldn't be defined by the label of disability because a label doesn't make you who you are. Don't think about what you can't do - think about what you can do."
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