I disclosed my disability on accepting the job, as a bit of an experiment considering that in the past when I've disclosed earlier in the process, I have magically not been offered anything (to the point of getting phoned up and being told that the role is EXTREMELY physical, made it sound like I was signing up for the salt mines, was I ABSOLUTELY SURE I wanted to progress my application? - BTW this is illegal).
My understanding of the 'inclusivity' barrow is that any employer should be aware that any employee at any time might develop a disability and need reasonable adjustments for the role, in the same way that any employer is aware that women of childbearing age might become pregnant and require maternity leave. It's just that disability is so segregated and stigmatised that people don't think it can happen to them and therefore things aren't planned accordingly.
I wasn't actually interviewed by the people I was going to be working with, and my line manager made it pretty clear early on that the team felt like they'd been lumped with me when I tried to tell him that I felt unwelcome. Even though there was a diversity and inclusion officer, they and their manager didn't return my emails, and my line manager wanted me to give a presentation on what I can't do to my local team, like, on my first day. He wasn't interested in my professional accomplishments to date or work history, just wanted to know what I 'couldn't do' and thought that was fine.
Disability is sort of a combination of the impairment and the environment you're in. For example, having a lift in a building rather than having to take the stairs can make the first floor more accessible to people who use wheelchairs or otherwise have trouble with stairs.
The new notion of a disability pride month was also distressing to me, as it's hard for me to have pride in it in the first place, and my team kept treating me like my stress at not having stuff explained to me properly (& not being allowed to explain it back to them to check my understanding) was part of my disability.
Honestly, there is a bit of pressure to be a model minority - bringing one's lived experience to the role, and feeling like I couldn't just be adequate. This wasn't helped by the person who was equal to me in rank telling me off for asking her what jobs I could do sitting down (when she spent much of her day fruitfully engaged in god-knows-what at her computer - she never told me what she did...). She always pressured me to be on my feet and elsewhere - perhaps because I was sat behind her in the office?
They kept me on past my probation period, but my line manager never really had those kinds of chats with me about my performance - and even though he'd told me the whole team wanted me, I didn't really see much evidence of that, and he didn't explain why they wanted me.
