Disabled mermaids "vs" tail companies?
Wasn't entirely sure whether to ask this or not but it's been bugging me a fair bit. Apologies if it's in the wrong place.
I'm currently training up to do mermaid stuff in my area and do so with two other lovely women, a friend of mine and her daughter. We go to the pool together and look out for each other, and have an agreement with the pool about everything safety wise.
Both my friend and her daughter swim far more regularly than me, in fact I only got back in a pool a couple months ago for the first time in years thanks to a busy life, but it seems a mermaid never forgets how to swim. We've all got Mahina monofins and the others have some extra lighter fins they've previously used, and have all proven to swim well in them.
The thing that some people apparently have a problem with however, is that my friend only has one leg. She's an amputee and usually wears a prosthetic of some sort but in the water she just puts on the monofin normally and has recently come up with a way of balancing it out with a sort of light counterweight made from a foot form (not even sure that's the right word). For someone with this to consider, my goodness she's a good swimmer. She swims almost daily as far as I know and is very serious and careful about it. She and her daughter recently got their first proper fabric tails made by Uramermaid and they were fantastic in them.
When at the pool the other day we were talking about silicone tails and the fact that one day when we're proficient enough, we may get some, or in her case invest in one and then work towards using it. The first problem we've discovered is that most of the sellers and makers we know won't ship to the UK. She even found a tail someone was selling that had been made far too tight for a two-legged person but would be great for her, but she can't seem to get it.
Then when talking to a tail company that I won't name, she received an email that got her quite annoyed. I may later edit this post if I can get the full details from her, but from what I heard her inquiries about a tail may have been met with some rudeness, and in particular they said that they, to paraphrase, "don't make tails for disabled swimmers".
Now let me say right now that all of us understand perfectly well how serious safety is, and we would be fine with companies having strict policies about swimmers who might have extra risks for whatever reason. Heck I think she might have even been much less annoyed if there didn't seem to be such a blunt approach taken, and I would be more understanding too if it turns out they were polite and have good reasons, but the fact is when she spoke to me it was obvious my friend had been made to feel judged, disregarded and unable to be taken seriously, because the person on the other end of the email had seemingly seen "amputee" and immediately thought "weak swimmer" or "liability".
I was irritated by all of this because they'd upset her and limited her options greatly. Admittedly at one point I legit started wondering where the line would be drawn at what was considered "disabled" in regards to swimming and whether mental disability was considered or just physical. Or whether the same thing would be said to a paralympic athlete. Naturally that was just me getting annoyed tbh, there's no need for it to get that dramatic. But I DO kind of feel like it would have been better if it were her own choice whether she gets to use a silicone tail or not, because I know she'd take responsibility for it too.
I dunno, what do you guys think? Were they being sensible? Unfair? Should it be my friend's choice? Are there other options she could consider? Perhaps is there someone who makes silicone tails who WOULD make one for an amputee and preferably ships to the UK?
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that's awesome! I personally love Finfolk's tails. Apparently they don't currently ship to the UK either but there's hopes they will one day.
Originally Posted by faithonthebass
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