#disability question

I've had unexplainable back pain for at least a couple-few years now (don't remember the exact timeline), and while I can and do push through it most of the time, I can't stand for too long. If I do, I always end up feeling it the next day/after a couple hours even if I don't feel it in the moment. I usually do feel it in the moment as well.

I have a job which requires me to stand and walk the entire time and I can do it, but most days either my back hurts at the time or the next day. I also feel what I believe to be an abnormal amount of fatigue afterwards.

So I can still perform normal tasks, and I can push through it, but it hurts.

i have an oc, Ethan, who had a big piece of rubble fall on him when he was a teen. This damaged his spinal cord and lungs, making him a wheelchair user for the rest of his life. I need help from people with similar disabilities/people in the medical field to help me make his life as a disabled person more realistic. I do not have those disabilities nor do I know anything about medical stuff (I am a art history and English lit student so yeah, not gonna be a doctor ;v;). I already have a few questions but feel free to share stuff if you feel it can be relevant, I really want him to be fleshed out as a disabled character. Questions I thought about were:

Will he get any types of phantom pains? If yes, for how long?

Should he have a machine to help his breathing since his lungs are damaged?

What kind of machine? (like, a tube down the throat, a mask...)

If he does have a machine, does he need to have it on always or is it more of a chronic thing?

If he needs to always have it on, how does he eat?

Would there be other disabilities on top of these two because of his accident?

These are all the questions I can think of for now, I'll add more if I think of other questions.

Like I said, feel free to share your experience or expertise or just anecdotes really.

(this list may seem super cramped, but it's a big cast)

I have characters with most of the more common mobility aids (a single leg amputee with no prosthetics that uses crutches/a wheelchair, a character with fibro who uses a powerchair, a main character who uses a cane due to POTS, another main character who has a prosthetic arm, a character who has a prosthetic arm & leg and uses a cane sometimes, a character in a wheelchair that needs to be moved by a caretaker)

And several conditions that characters in my book have that don't require/use mobility aids (main character with some ear/teeth malformations & possible BPD, main character with a cleft lip, multiple characters with autism, multiple characters with pshycosis from various sources, a main character with extremely heavy facial/neck burn scarring, one or two DID systems (neither of which are villainous), a character with mutism and a character with selective mutism, I can't think of any others but theres more I'm not lookong at a list rn)

I have several planned characters with various conditions also.

But I want people/beings to be able to see themselves in my work, so if you have any particular disability aids/conditions that you would like to see represented, let me know :)

I cannot promise that they will be a main character by any means, but the series is 10 books long, and going to be hopefully over a million words (not to mention the comic panels!) So I want to show as many types of person as I can, I want the settings to feel real, like actual people live there (even if that particular setting happens to be mars)

And none of that "if you're not medically recognized you're faking bullshit"

BPD

Autism

Adhd

PTSD/CPTSD

Fibromyalgia / serious chronic pain conditions

Dissociative disorders

I also want some opinions on how okay it would be to mention "I am undiagnosed __"

I already know for dissociative disorders it's ok but I figured I'd hear some more opinions