WHAT ARE YOU HIDING?

Ruth Rathblott wrote a book about hiding her physical disability. She says it resonated with a lot of people who are hiding all kinds of things.

For 25 years, Ruth Rathblott hid.

She hid her left hand because it was not fully formed. It's a tiny hand without functioning fingers. It was caused by something called amniotic band syndrome, a rare condition that occurs when the amniotic sac, the lining inside the uterus, gets wrapped around some part of the fetus. Imagine a tight rubber band wrapped tightly around the arm or leg or fingers of the fetus preventing it from developing. 

She didn't start out hiding her little hand. It began in high school. It was only supposed to be for one day. It lasted well into adulthood. It was only when her boyfriend literally took her by the hand -- that left hand -- did she begin to learn to stop hiding her disability, or as she likes to put it, to start un-hiding.

I wrote about Ruth's journey from hiding to un-hiding in November 2021. Since then, she has written a book about her life journey called Singledhandedly. It was published last fall. She says the biggest surprise was how much its message about un-hiding has struck people and not just people with disabilities, but people who hide a myriad of other things about themselves.

There's a relatively obscure Beatles song, Everybody's Got Something To Hide Except For Me and My Monkey. It has a point.

"The reality is most of us are hiding something about ourselves," Ruth says. "Hiding is truly universal." 

I spoke to Ruth recently about her story, and about hiding and un-hiding. Our conversation has been edited.

RC: In your book, you talk about the value in going public with your story, whatever hiding story it is. But I imagine some people just aren't comfortable with that.

RR:  I think that part of sharing your story out is part of the process of getting comfortable with yourself and self-acceptance. The first step in the process, Ron, is the idea of just sharing it with one person. Not needing to proclaim it or put it in a news headline, but to start to share it with one person. Find one trusted person that you can share your difference or your disability with. 

RC: How did that process for you lead to this book?

RR: When I started to share my story out to a larger community that wasn't about disability difference - it was actually in the diversity, inclusion and equity space - I started to realize that many people were felt different about other parts of their lives and were hiding (those) parts of themselves, and that there was a lot of pain out there around hiding. There were actually statistics on hiding, that people were hiding in the workplace. When I started to understand and do the research around this concept of covering or hiding, I started to realize that I wasn't alone in what I had done for 25 years. The best way that I knew was to take people on my journey of what hiding looked like for me. Where did I feel excluded in terms of disability? And then how could I show people how I un-hid, a personal tool kit for them to start to reflect on and think about. What are they hiding? What are the steps to un-hide?

RC: What are the kinds of things that people hide?

RR: People hide everything. They hide things like disability, visible disabilities like mine. They hide invisible disabilities like mental health or neuro-diversity. I've had people tell me that they hide their voice in terms of their accents or their stutters. I've had people share that they hide their education background. People hide their sexuality. People hide their religion. People hide their moving away and abandoning of religion. I've had people tell me that - not surprisingly - they hide their politics. Because they're afraid of that rejection, that judgment, and that fear being seen as not fitting in.

RC: You figuratively but also literally hid your disability.

RR: I started at the age of 13. I tucked my little hand, my limb difference, in the front left pocket of my jeans just for what was supposed to be a bus ride to school (after) I noticed that one of the kids stared at my hand a little too long on that bus ride the first day of high school. When you're 13, fitting in is magnified. I wanted to fit in badly. I was starting a new school. I wanted to make friends, so I thought for this bus ride, let me hide my hand so that people think I am the same. I got to school and I remember thinking, 'I'll just do it a little bit longer, just (until) I can make some friends.' That first day led to that first week, which led to that first year, which led to 25 years. I hid my hand in my pocket. I wore oversized sweaters, even in the summer, so people wouldn't see my hand. I hid my hand under bags. When I think about it now, it makes me sad. I thought it was disgusting. I thought it was gross. I thought everyone would think that. I hid it to protect myself. If I'm being honest, I think I hid to protect other people too, so they wouldn't have to see this monstrosity and be uncomfortable.

RC: Was it always a conscious action, or sometimes unconscious, or did it become unconscious?

RR: It started out definitely conscious and the more I did it, the more it just became unconscious. I didn't know any other way to be because that was my life. It was so repetitive for me. I didn't know another way of living. Of course, I was going to hide.

I often anticipated new situations. That was when it was a conscious thing, in new situations when I had to think, ‘How am I going to deal with this? How am I going to handle going to someone's house and having to hold hands to say grace?’ I became conscious in a new situation when I had to think, 'How am I going to deal with that?' 

RC: What kind of commonalities do people who hide share in terms of a psychic toll it takes?

RR: It's exhausting because you're constantly worried that someone is going to find out. So you are never at ease. There's not a sense of peace within yourself because you're constantly worried. So it's psychologically exhausting. You're disconnected not just from yourself, but from others. When you hide a part of yourself, you're worried what someone is going to think about us. We don't actually allow them in. So we're not really connecting with people. We're not really being quote-unquote authentic. That's where the loneliness part comes in. Because someone doesn't really get to know us. It's easier to just hide. In our minds.

RC: The book came out last year. What have you heard from readers?

RR: When the book first came out, I thought it would resonate with people in the disability space. I found that I wasn't the first person to hide (a) difference. There was wonderful feedback of, 'Ruth, that's my story, too,' There was a lot of resonance with this idea of hiding and the shame that comes with feeling different. What's been surprising is how many people are hiding part of themselves and sharing with me, 'You made me really think for the first time, ‘What am I hiding?’’ ‘How am I hiding?' 'Why am I hiding?' And, 'How do I un-hide'?' Someone recently told me that they're happy I did an audio book because their eyesight is failing them and they haven't shared that with people. I have had people share their experiences with their families, where there were family secrets that they were hiding and not talking about. Again, we're carrying all this. People are in pain with hiding. I've seen them exhale and I've seen the shoulder drops when people start to realize they're not alone and they don't have to carry this secret anymore. It frees them.

RC: But if you've been hiding some aspect of yourself for ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty years, it inherently has to be very, very difficult and for some people it is impossible to stop doing that.

RR: I wouldn't say it's impossible. It's a continuum. It's baby steps. It's telling that one person first that you trust, that HR person at work, that therapist. Un-hiding doesn't happen overnight. 

RC: Any advice to the person who wants to take that first step?

RR:I think there are probably two steps. If they feel like they want to un-hide and they feel stuck, reach out and contact me and talk about it [at www.ruthrathblott.com or via LinkedIn]. Again, I think the other piece is, if there is someone in your life, just one person that you feel you can talk to, share it. Get it out of you.