Elizabeth Long: Freedom Beyond the Tether

1) Episode Summary In this episode of The Blind Chick, Penn and Moses Street welcome Elizabeth Long, an outdoor adventurer from Ridgway, Colorado, whose story moves through hearing loss, vision loss, spinal injury, adaptive sports, and the long process of learning how to stop hiding and start living fully. Elizabeth shares how growing up around unspoken family attitudes toward disability shaped her early silence around hearing loss, and how learning ASL later became a doorway into community, confidence, and identity. She talks about moving from Michigan to southwest Colorado, falling in love with the mountains, rock climbing, ice climbing, skiing, and eventually discovering adaptive sports. The conversation becomes especially powerful as Elizabeth describes how adaptive skiing, including mono-skiing, helped her rediscover freedom without pretending her body had no limits. Penn connects deeply with Elizabeth’s story, especially around the grief of possibly giving up skiing and the possibility of finding a new way forward. At its heart, this episode is about not closing the door on your life when disability changes the rules. Elizabeth’s message is clear: you may have to do things differently, but differently does not mean lesser. 2) Contact Info Guest: Elizabeth Long Instagram: @sanjuanmtnchick Spelled: S-A-N-J-U-A-N-M-T-N-C-H-I-C-K Aftersight Website: Aftersight.org Phone: (720) 712-8856 Email: [email protected] Producer: Jonathan Price Podcast and Program Producer, Aftersight 3) Show Credits Show: The Blind Chick Hosts: Penn Street and Moses Street Guest: Elizabeth Long Producer: Jonathan Price Presented by: Aftersight