Communication barriers between 'the able-bodied' and 'the handicapped'

The specific details and hardships of having a handicap or chronic disease vary from person to person. But not the core problem. The story is inevitably difficult both to hear and to tell. The hearing brings up many basic fears of personal and social failure to the listener. The telling confronts the individual who has a handicap with the depressing realities to be faced every day. Moreover, the problems that both "the able-bodied" and "the handicapped" have in communicating with one another are rooted deep in Western culture.