Mel Harrison - Sitting Low, Reaching High

Barbara Sullivan 0:02

With information on the latest developments in assistive technology and initiatives from the studios of 2RPH in Sydney and around the country on the radio reading network of Australia, we bring you Ablequest. Hello. I'm Barbara Sullivan. Today's guest is Mel Harrison, a graduate of the podcasting and radio internship at 2RPH in association with disability Australia, Mel has been in a wheelchair since she was 14 and also wears hearing aids. Yet, despite her health issues, she's learned to successfully adapt to physical challenges. In 2022 Mel was the first ever wheelchair participant in an Australian Outback charity car rally. Using wired satellite accelerator hand controls, using her hand and thumbs to control the accelerator and brake, she and her crew were one of the 250 cars in a 3500 kilometre journey. The rally rules were strict. There were no four wheel drives, and the car had to be worth no more than $1,500. Mel is the epitome of resilience, working as a motivational speaker, consultant and disability educator for more than 20 years. Mel's motto is to keep reaching high, your confidence will grow and things can get better. Nine years ago, Mel founded her own company, Sitting Low, Reaching High, to focus on her passion for encouraging others and breaking down barriers for people with disabilities and to help them live their best lives free from abuse and neglect. Throughout her career, Mel has met thousands of people throughout Australia as the facilitator for disability expos around the country, in workshops and as trainer in disability advocacy. Elaine Wziontek caught up with Mel on the last day of the radio workshop.

Elaine Wziontek 1:59

So welcome to Ablequest, Mel - it's great to have you with us.

Mel Harrison 2:04

Yeah, it's great to be here. Thank you.

Elaine Wziontek 2:06

Can you tell... Mel, can you tell us about yourself and the services you provide at Sitting Low, Reaching High?

Mel Harrison 2:13

Yeah, absolutely. So the organisation or the business that I have is Sitting Low, Reaching High. And essentially the services that we provide is all around disability consulting, so anything from doing policy work or running events or running training, etc, across the country. So I've been working in the disability space for about 26 years now, so showing my age as well. But... so all the roles that I've ultimately ever had is working with people with disability to ensure that they can live their best life and also to be free from abuse and neglect that happens out there, because prevalence towards people with disability around violence is extremely high.

Elaine Wziontek 3:01

And I can see from the name, Sitting Low, Reaching High... you are sitting low at the moment.

Mel Harrison 3:09

Absolutely, yeah. So how I came up with the name was, so I use a wheelchair myself, and I used to be a very, very big, avid rock climber. So I absolutely love rock climbing, and because I can use my upper body strength to do that. And I have a photo where I'm not climbing in my wheelchairs in the photo, but down on the ground, and I'm up, you know, 10 meters up in the air doing it. And then just one night when I was out and I was looking at photos, etc, I was like, Oh, that would be a really cool name for my business: Sitting Low, Reaching High - which often people get it wrong, and they think it's Sitting High, Reaching Low. So that always makes me laugh.

Elaine Wziontek 3:54

That's not much good with a disability, is it? I understand that even though you're in a wheelchair, you've done a lot of cool things. And I was having a bit of a look at your website, and I saw a bit about a rally from Port Douglas to Adelaide, raising money for for cancer. Can you tell us about that? And I believe you got bogged one time.

Speaker 1 4:14

Yeah, absolutely. So I've done two rallies, so two Shitbox Rallies. The first one was from Mackay to Darwin, and the second one was from Port Douglas to Adelaide, driving a car. And the whole object of the rally is that you can only drive a car that's worth less than $1,500 it can only be a two wheel drive, so you can't have a four wheel drive, etc, and you're driving across the outback to raise money for Cancer Council. So over, over 80% of the roads are off road. So you're driving through bull dust, going across river crossings, mud pools, across rocks. Everything gets actually quite... quite an adventure. I'm pretty excited that I was the first person in a wheelchair using hand controls to ever do these rallies so and now there's another three people in wheelchairs that are doing it, because they were following me and they realised it could actually be done. So that's really exciting. And when we were going from Port Douglas to Adley, and we're going across the Birdsville track. So that's a famous road in in the middle of Australia. One of the tyres blew, and I got out of the car and I completely changed the tyre of the of the car. So I know how to actually do it. And everybody was watching me. I don't even think I'll ever do it again, but at least I can tell people how they can, so you can change your tyre. I can change a tyre and stay in the wheelchair....

Elaine Wziontek 5:49

Yeah, that's terrific. And you, that was when you were driving along the Birdsville Track, wasn't it?

Mel Harrison 5:54

Absolutely. Yep.

Elaine Wziontek 5:55

Pretty cool. So I'm talking to you on the last day of the 2RPH podcasting, radio internship. What's that been like for you?

Speaker 1 6:04

Yeah, it's been really good, actually. So during this internship, a there's another girl, Freya, who is being part of it, and she's one of my best mates, known her for a long time. So that was really good to to do, like a course with her, but the teacher and all the workers here and all of the the other people in the class, so we've all connected, and we've all got, like, different skill sets and different life history, etc, and it's just actually been a really, really pleasant kind of experience to be part of. So yeah, I think there should be more of them.

Elaine Wziontek 6:42

And we talked to Freya recently on, yeah, on this program at Ablequest. She has a different disability - she's blind. She uses the word blind, yeah, yeah. So how do you think you're going to use any skills that you've learned within the radio workshop? How will you use those moving forward?

Mel Harrison 6:59

So I guess moving forward, the stuff that I would use is, I guess, like with the work that I've always done, it's been pretty particular in the way that we deliver, like trainings or we run events, etc. So it's actually been really refreshing and lightning to see there's different ways that you can actually deliver different messages, etc, and have the same impact. So I think for me, that's actually something. A really big takeaway for me is to go... like trying to broaden my way that I do things - because it make... because it also makes it more accessible and more adaptive for more communities out there, and people will be engaged more as well.

Elaine Wziontek 7:43

So you work with women with disability, and so can you tell us what work you actually do, and how do you help them get their voices heard?

Mel Harrison 7:53

So I work with Lifeline Australia, and I deliver training around domestic and family violence against women with disability out there, as we know that women with disability are 40% more likely to experience domestic and family violence than women that don't have a disability. But even that statistic is quite high. Also if you are a woman that has an intellectual disability, the statistics state that it's 70 to 90% of women with intellectual disability experience sexual assault in their lifetime. So it's quite a high statistic that's out there. And my passion around working in that space is because we know that when it comes to domestic and family violence, it's... so taboo the topic, like people don't want to talk about it, but trial on disability on top of it, it's even less likely to be spoken about. But the prevalence is extremely high, but the... supports and services out there is extremely low. So I really have a passion about getting more people to not necessarily be able to do much about the situation or the scenario, but at least start believing it actually happens. Because once people start believing it happens, that's when change actually progresses after that.

Elaine Wziontek 9:16

So women with a disability are a lot more vulnerable. Is it because they can't fight back, or they don't have the confidence to fight back, or... ?

Mel Harrison 9:23

There's multiple ways. Often it's the fact that they're not seen as reliable witnesses. It could be the fact that the people that might be choosing violence against them are the people that they depend on for support and services and to help them because of having a disability. It could be the fact that, you know, people think that they're lying, or they've got challenging behaviors. So it's there's multiple reasons around it, but the reality is, is that even though we know that domestic, black and family violence is a crime, in the disability space it's often just seen as an in-house conduct issue, so it's swept under the carpet and it's not dealt with in the right way that it should be dealt with.

Elaine Wziontek 10:09

So what's your role? Do you organise the course, or you...?

Mel Harrison 10:12

So I don't organise this particular course, but I facilitate. So I deliver the course, so I deliver with another lifeline trainer. So I draw it all across New South Wales and the ACT, but I also was involved in writing the actual training material in the first place.

Elaine Wziontek 10:33

And you've also been involved with disability expos. One was just quite recently.

Mel Harrison 10:38

Yeah, yeah. So I've been working in the Disability Expo since 2016 so it's been eight, nine years now, and all across Australia, which is pretty cool. So there's two different types of Disability Expos. We have one where it's a two day expo, which is all about connecting people with disability with services, but then they also be like entertainment. And then there's the Workability Expo, which is a one day expo which is about connecting employers with people with disability to try and get them into mainstream employment and in open employment. So yeah, I get to facilitate and run the workshops for those particular expos, and they're pretty exciting. We had one last weekend, and we got one in two weeks' time in Adelaide, and then in Hunter, and then it just continues. Every two weeks there's pretty much an expo.

Elaine Wziontek 10:38

Yeah, I understand you're involved with the May 12 and 13 domestic violence alert training,

Mel Harrison 10:53

Yep. So it's the women with disability domestic and family violence training, and it's held in Dubbo. So that's the next one. And there's also one in the end of May, which will be held in Smeaton Grange, which is near Wollongong.

Elaine Wziontek 11:58

So if people want to get in touch with you as a motivational speaker or consultant, what's the best way to get in touch with you?

Mel Harrison 12:05

Go into my website. It's the best way I have a contact page. So www, dot, sitting low, reaching high dot com - or on my socials, it's pretty easy to find me and get in contact with me. so

Elaine Wziontek 12:21

So we look out for Mel Harrison - founder, Sitting Low, Reaching High, correct? That's been great talking to you, Mel, I'm glad we caught you before the end of the course. And that was Mel Harrison - founder, Sitting Low, Reaching High. And you can go to her website, sitting low reaching high dot com.

Barbara Sullivan 12:48

You have just been listening to Ablequest, a program that looks at developments in assistive technology and initiatives. from Elaine Wziontek and Barbara Sullivan, thank you for listening and goodbye till next program.