The Conservative Cave
Interests => Health & Fitness => Topic started by: vesta111 on December 12, 2010, 03:47:45 PM
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You know, I've always seen that campfire burning away at a distance, but never went to it.
Now my curiosity is sparked; I need to examine it, to see which primitives are at it, who at other campfires boast about all the money they're making.
Frank and all, what is considered a disability in today's world and is there an age limit.??
I myself am disabled yet I am not on any kind of disability at this time, I withdrew my 401K money and figure I can pay my mortgage and taxes on that for a few years as long as Hubby has a job.
You have no idea how many people tell me I am nuts not to go for SS disability, it is my money they say, yet I will wait until I can go just for the normal SS. Yes I am a crazy old broad but I know there are things I could work at from home if there was anyone hiring at this time.
Story for you frank----
When I went to work 22 years ago there was a woman there that had graduated from a local school for handicapped children. She was a bit slow mentally and had physical problems but she sure could count and pack fish. She had at that time worked for over 20 years, could not drive and had the mind of a 15 year old, ---lovely woman.
Anyway when she had worked there 30 years, the work stations changed and she could no longer sit at her job, she was retired.
The company found a tax loop hole that was to their benefit if they hired more of the young adults from that school. They put out a call to the school looking for others like my friend that could do the work, and be a benefit to the company.
The school went nuts and sent in young adults on gurneys, people that wandered away from their work station and frankly needed a nursing assistant at their side. They sent in perhaps 15 patients that had no idea where they were or how to do anything but feed themselves and needed diaper changes.
This school had at least a couple of young adults that could have benefited from a job as my friend did but they were never sent. My friends mother ranted about this to us.
This display caused the company to loose heart and any handicapped people were hired from the outside. And they did hire those with a handi cap as long as they could do the job.
Why did this famous school send in people that were unqualified to live on their own much less work at anything.??
I tell you frank I would love to have a job that I can do with my disability but even at less then minimun wage, the jobs are just not there.
There is a whole bunch of millions of people out there with a handi cap that can work at something, answer phones, do billing or inventory from home computers.
However like the end of WW2 when woman were encouraged to give up their jobs so the returning troops could work, ---the handicapped are in the same place, why take a job from an able bodied youngster when the handicapped can get government benefits. Makes me want to kick a door as Obama did, I understand his frustration.
About the carnival and the freak shows, I believe that the people with some kind of abnormality should be able to make their living any way they can .
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vesta, dear, sweetheart, I'm making this a stand-apart thread, and am going to move it, as it's a topic fully worthy of discussion, but in a more-appropriate place.
Once I'm done with all the intricate mechanics and sweaty labor of moving it, I'm going to respond.....and it might be of Bostonian Drunkard length, as it's a good topic.
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The definition of "disability" seems to be pretty broad and all-encompassing, vesta, dear, and no, there's no "age limit" in considering any sort of life-limiting affliction as a disability.
I suspect a divergence of opinions about its definition occurs between decent and civilized people on one hand, and the primitives on the other.
To decent and civilized people, a "disability" means there's some sort of activity that one can't do, thus limiting one's opportunities in life.
A blind man, for example, is never going to get hired as a movie critic, or a deaf man as a music critic.
That cuts down one's employment opportunities somewhat.
A mute man is never going to be able to seduce a woman with persuasive words.
That cuts down on one's romance opportunities somewhat.
To primitives, a "disability" means one aspires to be a ballerina, but as one weighs 400 pounds with a big black wart in the center of the forehead, one has to settle for working on a receiving dock somewhere, which causes one to become "depressed," and ultimately justifies leaping aboard the disability gravy train because one is too depressed, or even too lazy, to work, because one isn't prancing across a stage.
I dunno what I ever aspired to be, other than a second Lord Frederick Lugard or Lawrence of Arabia or Henry R. Luce, and I could have very well been any one of these; these guys after all had certain disabilities.
But time and chance didn't work out that way; I'm just franksolich.
I'll write more in a bit, vesta, but I'm out of cigarettes, and have to venture through the cold and the wind and the snow to get some more.
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http://www.ucp.org/ucp_channeldoc.cfm/1/13/12632/12632-12632/6184
SSI should be reserved for those who are significantly cognitively, physically impaired and/or medically fragile --- and some severe mental illnesses (sorry, depression doesn't make that list). Note that cognitively impaired could be functionally intellectually impaired -- which would be in the case of autism. While the person with autism could put together a locomotive or space shuttle if given the opportunity, they cannot carry over that cognitive ability to all facets of their lives.
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http://www.ucp.org/ucp_channeldoc.cfm/1/13/12632/12632-12632/6184
SSI should be reserved for those who are significantly cognitively, physically impaired and/or medically fragile --- and some severe mental illnesses (sorry, depression doesn't make that list). Note that cognitively impaired could be functionally intellectually impaired -- which would be in the case of autism. While the person with autism could put together a locomotive or space shuttle if given the opportunity, they cannot carry over that cognitive ability to all facets of their lives.
But I'm not sure if vesta's asking for the strict legal definition of the word, or the broader, more informal, meaning of the word. I'm replying as if her question deals with the latter.
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The school went nuts and sent in young adults on gurneys, people that wandered away from their work station and frankly needed a nursing assistant at their side. They sent in perhaps 15 patients that had no idea where they were or how to do anything but feed themselves and needed diaper changes.
This school had at least a couple of young adults that could have benefited from a job as my friend did but they were never sent. My friends mother ranted about this to us.
This display caused the company to loose heart and any handicapped people were hired from the outside. And they did hire those with a handi cap as long as they could do the job
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:whatever:
Name of company and school Vesta because I don't believe one word of it.
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But I'm not sure if vesta's asking for the strict legal definition of the word, or the broader, more informal, meaning of the word. I'm replying as if her question deals with the latter.
That is my definition of disabled. All children are capable of learning. Learning coping skills, basic living skills, vocational skills required to become contributing members of their community? all dependent on their parents, and how willing they are to fight for critical services to get them those skills. School districts are horrendous to children with special needs. I could actually write a book on it. Few actually get it.
Sigh. Vicious cycle, but if mom and dad don't have the capacity to fight (be that indifference, complancency, or intellectual laziness to learn how) then child will most likely become a ward of the state when they reach the age of adult.
Those with skills would love to work. SSI places a limit on how many hours they can work. The risk is not to monthly checks, but to housing, which they could never afford without assistance.
Again, write a book. If I wasn't too damn busy trying to change the world in their regard I would write that book. Someday I will.......
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That is my definition of disabled. All children are capable of learning. Learning coping skills, basic living skills, vocational skills required to become contributing members of their community? all dependent on their parents, and how willing they are to fight for critical services to get them those skills. School districts are horrendous to children with special needs. I could actually write a book on it. Few actually get it.
Again, write a book. If I wasn't too damn busy trying to change the world in their regard I would write that book. Someday I will.......
Actually, madam, you may just get a book out of this thread; while I was going to town to get some cigarettes, it occurred to me that there's virtually thousands of things unsaid, but which need to be said, about disability, and so now suddenly I'm looking at this as a week-long or ten-days'-long thread; I have tons of stuff to say.
Which nicely coincides with the gap between voting for the top primitives, and announcing the winners, when there's nothing to write about, since I've put off "Mrs. Alfred Packer does Christmas" until she's done mourning, and can enjoy that story better.
What might be of special interest to you, madam, is that if I've understood the problems for your son correctly, he and I are very much alike (other than the deafness part; but in all other things), and so one hopes it might prove illuminating, or at least amusing, for you.
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To put it bluntly, vesta, dear, one can't euphemize "disability."
None of this "other-abled" crap.
It's real, and it limits one's perception and one's opportunities in life.
I am deaf. I have a considerable speech impediment. And those most-vague of things, "residual autism" and "transient [or intermittent] retardation" (I dunno where the latter two terms came up, but they're on physician reports about me).
Oh, and I don't have a right elbow, either.
So I'm not a complete person; that is a blunt fact.
However, that does not make me any less of a person than any other person.
I dunno why this is, but this is; it seems I was born knowing God Is; it's not a matter of belief with me, but a matter of my actually knowing God Is, just as much as one knows the air and the water and the soil surrounding one.
To God, everyone is equally valuable.
When it comes to Immortal Souls, there are no "1.1"s and ".9"s to God; every soul is the same, a "1," no more, no less.
And of course it is only the Opinion of God that matters.
It matters not, and never has, what other people judge one to be--in this time and place, yes (after all, one wants one's boss or neighbors to think highly of one), but in the Eternal Order of things, no.
Obviously, franksolich has never suffered from an inferiority complex, but whatever.
I consider that acknowledgement of God to be the main pillar in this life, this pig-headed insistence that despite the life-limiting disabilities, to God franksolich is worth no more, and most certainly no less, than any other person.
I'm tired at the moment; this after all can be a quick energy-draining thing, but the next few days, I'd like to reveal the problems, and creative solutions (and some rather massive screw-ups on my part), for dealing with various disabilities.
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That got my eyes all teary Frank. Very beautiful. Looking forward to reading more.
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That got my eyes all teary Frank.
Oops, sorry, madam; I didn't mean to.
But I suspect that "attitude" is why I've been much more of a "success" in life than most other deaf people.
I haven't been a howling success when compared with hearing people, but trust me, when compared with people like myself--my own small distinct peer group--I've gone places, scaled heights, done things, that might not impress hearing people, but leaves my own people speechless.
It's a mixture of that healthy God-is-with-me-who-can-prevail-against-me, and that unhealthy audacious arrogance.
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I must say, vesta, dear, a disability is multifaceted, and its tentacles worm into other aspects of one's life.
In my case, even though most might consider deafness the "principal handicap," at least socially and externally, it's minor when compared with speech.
It's because people can't see deafness, but they can hear speech.
And that's always been a real obstacle to "good first impressions."
In fact, I can't recall that I've ever made a good first impression ever.
My speech is as slow, flat, and wide as the Platte River; there are no hesitations, no stuttering, no stammering, no lisping; every single word is utterly distinct and separate. It's only that it's slow. I think the "average" person usually talks something like 200 words a minute; mine is circa 40 words a minute. (I could be wrong on the exact number; all I know for sure is that my speech "registers" only one-fifth as fast as "normal" speech.)
People for whom English is a second language, or people who know English only a little, appreciate this in me, but unfortunately my contacts are usually with native speakers of English.
To top it off--this was something the speech therapists could never resolve--there appears an actual physical inability to utter the short "e" sound, the most common sound in the English language, which means I've never been able to pronounce my own name correctly.
(I'm sure psychiatrist would have a field day analyzing the ramifications of that.)
When someone summons "Matt" or "Tad" or "Brad" or "Thad," it's me, and I explain later.
I did not take speech therapy until my first semester as a junior in college, and it was, easily, the most difficult chore I've ever undertaken in my life. Before then, I had stuttered and stammered (but never lisped) a lot, and was generally incomprehensible to all those not intimately acquainted with me.
Because of the urgency of the situation--I was after all 19, 20, years old, rather late to learn how to talk--I spent four afternoons a week for two years, dealing with lots of good-looking women in their mid- or late-20s working on their advanced degrees in speech pathology.
They got rid of the stuttering-and-stammering (and taught me to stop uttering multi-syllabic words only halfway through, going on to the next half-completed word), but at the "cost" of my losing inflections in the tone of my speech; but that was a small price to "pay" for a greater "benefit." I may speak as flat as the cornfields of Illinois, but at least there's no spittings and hesitations, and every word distinct and crystal-clear.
Despite this substantial improvement--and trust me, it was substantial--in speech, it's still woefully poor, and one can't do anything about it.
And here we get into the "first impressions," or the "social" aspects of it.
franksolich looks utterly average, utterly normal, the absence of ears being covered up by hair that is longer-than-normal (for a male), but not overly so. So one can't see the deafness, and as long as I remain mum, nothing bad happens; I'm just an utterly average, utterly normal, person.
But the minute I open my mouth, it jars or jolts the other person.
There's something wrong here, and they can't see it or figure it out.
This bothers decent and civilized people only a little, and as time goes on, not at all, but it really gets on the nerves of those with temperaments of rectal apertures.
This is why my current amusement with Chief S itting Bull, the bird-smacking stoned red-faced primitive, because he so very well resembles some people in real life; people with volatile, violent temperaments who get all upset and bent out of shape and stony-eyed and apoplexically red-faced, smoke coming out of their ears and nostrils, the first time I say something, even if a harmless "good morning."
I mean to say it really upsets them. It's a miracle I've never been hit, although it's been a close-run thing.
(As I learned how to deal with it, I actually began using it--the voice--as something to discombobulate self-righteous primitives, liberals, and bleeding-heart Democrats; I employ this all the time, just to get them into a stunned wild-eyed frenzied paroxysm, because to be honest, I am not always a nice guy. Most of the time, yes, but not always.)
Some people have a real hostility against diversity, apparently.
With decent and civilized people, there are ways of ameliorating bad first impressions (one can only ease, not cure).
For example, my third day as manager of the Reunion in Lincoln, a privately-owned student union on the campus of the University of Nebraska, I happened to be standing out in the food-court when a "runner" from the insurance office where the owner worked came in, carrying a bundle of paychecks.
The runner, like me, was new in the job, only his second or third day too.
Since the building was rather large, and he seemed in a hurry, I went up to him and offered to take the paychecks, so he wouldn't have to walk way over to where he was supposed to leave them.
He looked at me rather queerly, and said no, he would deliver them to the office.
Which was, of course, my office.
I shrugged my shoulders and went back to doing whatever it was I had been doing.
The runner entered my office, laughing and snorting, and told everyone he had been accousted by one of the retarded people bussing tables in the food court who claimed to be the manager and wanted to take the paychecks.
Oh well. Excresence happens. One accepts, adapts, and moves on.
I had been wearing only "average" clothes that day, looking just like everybody else.
From there on out, so as to deflect from the voice, I wore pin-striped three-piece suits every day; a little bit too "dressy" for the environment, but not overly so. This way, people would notice the clothes, instead of the voice, and make their first-impression judgements based upon that.
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Strange that you brought that up Frank.
I went for a job interview with a small company where the owner and CEO did the interviewing him self.
Problem, the owner had one of the worse stutters I have ever heard. The interview lasted about 30 minutes of the worse frustration I have ever felt.
The stutter itself forced me to want to interupt him and finish the word for him. For some unknown reason I wanted to bolt out of the room as my brain was turning to jelly. like nails on a chalk board.
I did not get the job but I did later meet up with the woman who had received the position. Nice woman but darn near deaf herself.
She told me some interesting things about her boss. He seldom stuttered when around people he had known for a while.
Also when a problem came up and strangers were around, he could get the point across by SINGING the words. No stutter when he sang.
Years later a forman of mine had Torrets and controlled his outburst with singing Italian Opera. You Bitch he would yell at me, then burst into an aria from some Opera that was vaguely familiar.
I learned more cuss words from him then I did from my Father, some very descriptive when the target was a male.
For the poster that does not believe my story about the company and their experiment with the disabled adults, there is one other on the forum that may remember that time way back in 1990 or so. They will also remember the singing foreman I speak of.
The disabled that grow up with a disability are much better adjusted then the Adults that due to accident or disease become disabled, especially if they are over 50 when it happens. Much easier to place them on disability then to retrain them in another job they can do. Age is important as the cost to retrain someone for a job that may not have an opening in or few, with a work time expectation of only a few years ahead of them.
Waiting lists for new training may be a couple of years long and choices must be made between the people that will benefit for 20-30 years down the line in the work force then someone who will only work 10 years if that.
This is like triage, , who will need the training the most, a 21 year old or a 60 year old, sort of a social death panel here, who do we save before the others.
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Frank, the idiot from the insurance office never matured past high school. Unfortunately you see this a great deal.
I have a question -- what services did you get from school? no SLP, which is astonishing to me. If you mind me asking, how old are you? I want to place special education to the time frame you grew up.
Do me a favor. Write a book. You are an amazing self-advocate. You are inspiring. Disability groups from all over the country would pay for you to come to their conferences to speak -- and no one will mind for a second how long your speech would take to give.
Parents of children with severe special needs need to see you. Need to hear from you. Hope is the greatest gift you can give someone, and you in a word Frank are that hope they are looking for.
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KC
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Frank, the idiot from the insurance office never matured past high school. Unfortunately you see this a great deal.
It ended well; we became, and remain, good friends.
I was about thirty years old when this happened, and had long ago gotten used to it.
The owner of the Reunion was the biggest Democrat then in Lincoln, and usually hired Young Dems from the University of Nebraska for such jobs, but how this kid, apolitical, sneaked in, I have no idea. He never made any pretensions about being "socially conscious" or respectful of "diversity," or wore his "tolerance" on his sleeve.
Unlike Dems, liberals, and primitives, the first impressions he got of other people were not engraved in stone.
There was another runner, who was president of the University of Nebraska Young Dems for four years, who did make a big show out of his being morally superior to mere other people. A sour, dour, always-grimacing rimless-eyeglassesed short little guy. He always insisted upon--and got--being called "James," rather than any short informal variation of his name. Even David Hunter, who was rarely sensitive, never dared call him anything but "James," either to his face or behind his back.
He once expressed sentiments that "other people" should be "nicer" to me.
After which, and until the end, I always called him "Jimbo," both to his face and when referring to him.
By the way, the occupation hazards of the deaf were pretty well covered in this long short story, "the best boss I ever had," but I'll warn you; it's the second-longest thing I've ever posted here; it's long (but one hopes, funny).
http://www.conservativecave.com/index.php/topic,30787.0
And there's this, which was no story, but rather a complaint in the "Crying In My Beer" forum here, about one of my attempts at dealing with similar issues on the job.
http://www.conservativecave.com/index.php/topic,11722.0
And finally, my call-out to Chief S itting Bull, this election night past.
Actually, besides his ill-fated gloating and bloating election night 2008, pronouncing the Republican party dead forever, and besides his, uh, rather unusual way of dealing with his affliction, Chief S itting Bull appeals to me for a third reason.
I know people like Redstone in real life; not many, but a few.
(And coincidentally, they're all "socially conscious" Dems.)
Myself having been born deaf, I have no idea what a voice really sounds like, but in my case, this voice is as flat and wide and slow as the Platte River of Nebraska.
No stumbling, no stuttering, no stalling, just really slow.
(Actually, foreigners, those for whom English is a second language, and those who are trying to learn English, like to hear me, because I'm allegedly "understandable" to them--but of course 99% of my communicative contacts are with those from this time and place.)
I look utterly normal, utterly average.
And so it can be disconcerting for a person seeing me the first time, when I start to speak.
All my life, ever since I was about 2' tall, I've noticed that while this attribute bothers decent and civilized people only little, or not at all, it really really really "gets to" a certain species of people.
The hot-tempered, the chipped-on-the-shouldered, and "socially conscious" Dems.
And of course the bird-smacking stoned red-faced primitive is (a), (b), and (c) above; all of them.
I've always said it's a good thing Redstone and I have never met in real life, because it wouldn't turn out well. I already know what's going to happen, as I've seen this reaction in his kind of person.
The eyes crossing to inside of the head, smoke puffing out of the ears, mouth paralyzed wide-open, face turning dark red, hands becoming claw-like, nostrils flaring, and blood vessels inside the skull popping and bursting, causing an apoplexic fit.
I'm a nice guy; I don't want Chief S itting Bull to suffer an apoplexic fit.
I guarantee you that would be Redstone's reaction to franksolich.
Past, and numerous, experience doesn't lie.
http://www.conservativecave.com/index.php/topic,50652.0.html
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I have a question -- what services did you get from school? no SLP, which is astonishing to me. If you mind me asking, how old are you? I want to place special education to the time frame you grew up.
Grade school in the 1960s, high school in the 1970s.
No "special services," excepting those given by medical professionals usually in Omaha (and hence paid for by my parents). I went to school in two towns, one alongside the Platte River and the other deep inside the Sandhills of Nebraska, both towns circa 3,000 people.
The only "special services" at the time were offered to the mentally-retarded, who spent half a day in their own "school" (in both cases, a converted Victorian-era residence), and half a day with regular kids.
School, from kindergarten through college, was a dull, dreary, melancholy time--years and years, remember--for me, but no point dwelling on such things. Looking back, it seems I was really "home-schooled;" after all, it was my father who taught me to read, my mother who taught me to write, one older brother who taught me arithmetic and mathematics, another older brother who taught me science and geography, and about 6,000 other people (in both towns) who taught me history, sociology, and good manners.
That I grew up in a small place, where one could absorb the world in bite-sized pieces, I consider one of the most fortunate things that ever happened to me. I would probably be sitting on my ass, collecting social security disability, and hanging around Skins's island, if I had grown up in a crowded dirty congested urban area with too many people and too much "action."
My parents, medical professionals, would not allow me to learn sign language, thinking it would be a "crutch" that would severely limit my communication with other people. As you know, most other people communicate by talking and listening, and that's the bigger, wider, world in which my parents wished me to be.
It's been a very stressful life, fraught with all sorts of mishaps, mistakes, and catastrophes--for which I blame a rather awesome ulcer and an incessant need to "be left alone"--but one deals with life with the cards one's been given, and makes out the best one can.
My parents died when I was still a teenager, and for years afterwards, even these days, other people insist they made some, uh, "bad decisions" regarding my upbringing. I however beg to differ.
Life rarely presents one the options of a "good" choice and a "bad" choice; life more often presents one with a "bad" choice and an "even worse" choice.
I was a phenomenon new to my parents (who were middle-aged when I was born) (and to my teachers), and they handled things the best ways they possibly could.
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.....the owner had one of the worse stutters I have ever heard.
My paragon, Henry R. Luce, was a notorious stutterer, and his wife Clare Boothe Luce had the unfortunate habit of making it worse for him (but at any rate it was a happy marriage until death).
As he got older, Henry R. Luce also lost his hearing, and his wife Clare Boothe Luce had the unfortunate habit of making it worse for him (but at any rate it was a happy marriage until death).
He seldom stuttered when around people he had known for a while.
I can see where such would happen, because one's more confident around people one knows.
Me, I can "hear" better people I know, than people I don't, even if the latter is more expressive than the former.
The disabled that grow up with a disability are much better adjusted then the Adults that due to accident or disease become disabled.....
Yes, and that's something that needs emphasized more than it is.
If one grows up never having known any other sort of life, any bitterness or anger over the "problem" is much less than if one had once had something, and lost it.
My fellow alum Skins, like a true Dem, liberal, and primitive, lumps people together, even if they're very different. He has this "deaf and hard-of-hearing" forum, as if the problems and attitudes are all alike.
I on the other hand put them into four categories, apples, oranges, penguins, and rocks.
Apples are those who were born with good hearing but in life lost some or most of it; the most-common group.
Oranges are those who were naturally born hard of hearing.
Penguins are those who were born with good hearing but in life lost all of it.
Rocks are those who never had hearing, period.
Four wholly different sorts of people, and the apples and penguins the saddest of them all. franksolich, who of course is more intimately acquainted with more people with problems hearing, than the general public, has nothing, nothing at all, in common with apples and penguins, and only very little in common with oranges.
The differences in perceptions and attitudes are possibly more of a chasm than the difference between the problems a blind man faces, and the problems a legless man faces.
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The time frame on your schooling makes sense now. Prior to IDEA. This is a crazy week for me, so I haven't had a chance to read your links. I will do so this weekend.
Great conversation here.
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The time frame on your schooling makes sense now. Prior to IDEA.
Well, but I actually had "services," madam, although not formal academic ones.
The choice, in those long-ago days, was to either send me to the Omaha School for the Deaf, or to keep me at home without formal "services."
As I said, life rarely presents one with a choice between a "good" option and a "bad" option; it more often gives one a choice between a "bad" option and an "even-worst" option.
My parents gambled (whether they won or not won't be known until the end of my own life) on these things: (a) they were medical professionals who although utterly unfamiliar with deafness, at least competent; (b) large family with much interaction between the children; (c) small town life, with caring neighbors and good friends who were aware of the circumstances; and again, (d) small town life with its mellow, laid back, casual, informal pace which made the world "digestable" one small bite at a time.
One of the advantages overlooked, I think, was that we were the only family in both towns not to have a television set. I dunno why that was, but that's the way it was. My parents weren't anti-television or anything, but just never got around to getting one.
I can speak only for the deaf and hard of hearing, but it's probably true for children with other disabilities, too; television presents too much noise, too much distraction, too much interruption--and simply just too much, period--for those whose ability to absorb the world is rather, uh, limited.
I frankly suggest that if one has a child who is disabled, that the television set be relegated to the attic, to gather dust until the child is grown.
The "special services" I got, as mentioned above, it was my father who taught me to read, my mother to write, one older brother to do arithmetic and mathematics, another older brother science and geography, and all the good and decent people of small town America, history, sociology, and good manners.
I can't imagine a paid professional doing nearly as well as they did.
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Well, but I actually had "services," madam, although not formal academic ones.
The choice, in those long-ago days, was to either send me to the Omaha School for the Deaf, or to keep me at home without formal "services."
As I said, life rarely presents one with a choice between a "good" option and a "bad" option; it more often gives one a choice between a "bad" option and an "even-worst" option.
My parents gambled (whether they won or not won't be known until the end of my own life) on these things: (a) they were medical professionals who although utterly unfamiliar with deafness, at least competent; (b) large family with much interaction between the children; (c) small town life, with caring neighbors and good friends who were aware of the circumstances; and again, (d) small town life with its mellow, laid back, casual, informal pace which made the world "digestable" one small bite at a time.
One of the advantages overlooked, I think, was that we were the only family in both towns not to have a television set. I dunno why that was, but that's the way it was. My parents weren't anti-television or anything, but just never got around to getting one.
I can speak only for the deaf and hard of hearing, but it's probably true for children with other disabilities, too; television presents too much noise, too much distraction, too much interruption--and simply just too much, period--for those whose ability to absorb the world is rather, uh, limited.
I frankly suggest that if one has a child who is disabled, that the television set be relegated to the attic, to gather dust until the child is grown.
The "special services" I got, as mentioned above, it was my father who taught me to read, my mother to write, one older brother to do arithmetic and mathematics, another older brother science and geography, and all the good and decent people of small town America, history, sociology, and good manners.
I can't imagine a paid professional doing nearly as well as they did.
You were blessed Frank to have had the parents that took the time to recognise that you and others are human with the ability to think and grow.
Just a short story of my only experience with a deaf child.
Michelle was the result of a skiing Accident. Her parents had spent a weekend at a ski resort and she was created there. Her parents married and when she was around 6 months old the mother who was still in college became concerned. First baby, she the mother, instinctively knew there was something wrong
The father in the Navy was gone 6 months of the year and he himself when home had no knowledge of what was normal for baby's..
Michelle was progressing normally physically, she could sit up roll over hold her bottle ,but she was different in a way from other baby's her age.
The Mother had every test in the book done on the baby at Military hospitals, the final diagnosis was that Michelle was born retarded, mentally retarded and would some day need to go into a hospital for life.
After the diagnose the parents gave up, they kept her safe in a crib, clean and dry, gave her a bottle when she was hungry but that was it. Poor Michelle all day and night in her bed with no stimulus, so sad.
The day came when the mother had to leave to go to a funeral way across country and her husband was at sea. I agreed to care for Michelle for a week.
The instructions I got for her care were odd, I had two children at the time and was rather surprised at the doctors orders for her care. She was to be kept away from any stimulus that would scare her, --that meant in a crib in a room away from everyone.
Michelle was a good baby, but on the first night I had her I heard something that sounded like a sheep bleating. She was hungry and crying, the sound was so strange that I got her bottle and fed her sitting in a rocking chair, wondering what the hell was wrong with this baby.
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As I had to care for my own two kids I found it helped to bring Michelle out into the living room in a play pen instead of having to run into her room when she began to cry.
No frighting stimulus the doctors had said----I had two little kids running about, a dog that for some reason wanted to jump into the play pen with the baby, one day I was curious and put the dog in there with her and she came to life, eyes all aglow she was around 18 months at this time and she bonded to that dog. I should say the dog bonded to her, he became very protective of her.
It was her cry that disturbed me the most. I had been shown the doctors papers saying she was retarded yet when my kids ran about shouting and the dog would bark, she never looked in their direction.
I tried to bath her in the tub but she had a hissie fit and only a sponge bath would do.
When her mother came back to get her I asked her if Michelle could be deaf. Oh No, the doctors say she is just not paying attention. WTF
The mother was not happy that I had her daughter out of her room in the middle of the mad house that family's have, nor was she happy that her daughter was sleeping in a play pen with her little arms wrapped around a --a dog.
20 years later through someone that I met and knew the family I found out what had happend to the Michelle. I wrote to her mother asking how her daughter had fared in the past years.
The answer I got was the parents had divorced, the mother had gotten her degree in college. As a side note I was told that once the mother was divorced she had taken Michelle to be placed in a School for the retarded.
Michelle was about 3 at the time and it took the Civilian Doctors less then a week to find out the child was deaf, not retarded.
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vesta, dear, I've known you for a long time, and I must say your two posts above are easily, the best writing you've done here, impressive writing well worth the read.
Keep cultivating that talent, madam, dear. It's in you.
Misdiagnosing deaf infants as retarded is of long practice, and still being done today.
It's because we tend to be unresponsive, which is interpreted as retardation.
Nothing animates us, nothing excites us, nothing discombobulates us. We just lay there.
I dunno where the statistic comes from, but it's usually in "diversity workshops;" that people pick up 80% of their information, 80% of their stimuli, from hearing, and the other 20% from seeing, touching, smelling, and tasting.
That's 80%, four-fifths of all that one knows, from hearing.
This might surprise those who think "vision" is the most-important sense.
I can measure only myself, in which case it does seem that, generally, I'm only 20% as knowledgeable about things as the average hearing person. Since I have a habit of stretching myself to the limit while many others don't, it may be even worse than that for other deaf people.
We're woefully naive and ignorant, but it's not because of any lack of cerebral cells.
It's because we don't hear things that animate, that spark, that stimulate, the cerebral cells.
I have no doubt I'm going to die (one hopes, of old age) with most of my own cerebral cells virgin, never used.
There are oftentimes comments such as "well, your other senses compensate for the one you don't have, which is why you see (detect visual clues) better than average people."
That is true to an extent, but only to a very minimal extent. It's like adding one more horsepower to a 360-horsepower engine. No more than that. A little bit, but not much.
There is no substitute for hearing.
I've always been really surprised, pleasantly surprised, at how franksolich has written a few thousand words or so here on this site the past three years, and no one seems to have ever detected the bloopers, the blunders--and there's been some big ones--made simply because I didn't know some piece of information.
Or perhaps they have noticed, but being decent and civilized people, were kind enough to not mention it.
Seriously, there are gaps in perception here, which make me slower, perhaps even stupider, than hearing people, but again, refer to one of my very first comments in this thread. Everyone is a "1" to God, no more, no less, and as it's only the judgement of God that matters, how humans rate and rank other humans (their worthiness, their intelligence, whatnot) is simply irrelevant.
(As I also said, franksolich has no inferiority complex, which might or might not be a good thing.)
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I must say the internet has been a great equalizer, at least for the deaf (who are literate; many are not).
Since with the written word, everyone hears (or "hears") what's being said--as compared with real life, in which some of us confront blank spaces or white spots--and since what's being said in writing, as compared with talking, is right there, indisputably in black ink on white paper, there's no question about what's been said.
In real life, franksolich and others like him are nowhere near as articulate; not even close.
It's a level playing-field, the internet.
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I must say the internet has been a great equalizer, at least for the deaf (who are literate; many are not).
Since with the written word, everyone hears (or "hears") what's being said--as compared with real life, in which some of us confront blank spaces or white spots--and since what's being said in writing, as compared with talking, is right there, indisputably in black ink on white paper, there's no question about what's been said.
In real life, franksolich and others like him are nowhere near as articulate; not even close.
It's a level playing-field, the internet.
Strange thought came to me today Frank.
What about the people that are born with senses we, so called normal people, don't have.?
Edger Casey was not born a physic but the result on a head injury later in life. Peter Herko- [spel] same thing, a bop on the head and their lives changed.
At a table in a religious center listening to music sat a very young girl alone. She was Asian and I wondered where her parents were. This girl was beautiful so why was she alone, where were the boys who had to have noticed her, or adults in charge of her.
I curiosity after an hour went to her table and asked her if she was waiting for someone. She with perfect English told me she had come with teachers at UNH and that she would be leaving shortly to go back to campus. I was a bit surprised as she was way too young to be a college student so I asked if her parents were on the Staff at the school---NO, they lived in China. She was here on a 2 year exchange program with China's other TEACHERS.
Now I know the Asian women do not age as we do, but looking 12-14 was a bit unusual. She was in fact 15 and taught Nuclear Biology and spoke 4 or five languages--fluently.
I think you would have liked this little girl Frank, she was the polar opposite of you and most of us. She had been born with perfect recall, She needed no hours of practice on the piano, took no notes in class, she just remembered things --she gave it no thought of why this was, it was just HER.
Sad that so called normal people were afraid of her, it seemed that any deviance from the normal be it people that either had or had not NORMAL trites were a fear to others.
Finally the adults came and got her, she to my surprise looked into my eyes and told me she would remember me for my concern and attention.
I went back to the table my Husband was sitting at all this time alone, waiting patently for me to unglue my self from this child and when Husband asked me WTF---
The first thing off the top of my mind was----Holy shit, I think I just met an Angel.
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Okay, so here's another example of how one thing can have far-reaching tentacles digging in all over.
Today happened that someone, a stranger, approached me too closely.
No malicious intent; just a bubbly, effervescent sort of personality.
No one, but no one, approaches me; if so inclined, I go to them instead.
Because God has a sense of humor, God however gave franksolich the aura of being utterly approachable, the sort of impression that attracts dogs, small children, pretty women, the whole span of humanity. Since they have that impression, they think I'm actually that way.
Uh, no.
When such happens, on the inside, I recoil back, shuddering as if a rattlesnake pulling back to decide whether or not to strike. Because I'm a good actor, this shows on the outside only a little bit, and fortunately much of the time it's so subtle the other person doesn't notice it.
I am after all a polite person.
It's even worse if someone an utter stranger to me, actually touches me.
If I'm the one doing the approaching, it's all copacetic, no problem.
I've always wondered if this was something made necessary by deafness, or if it's a mental problem.
But at the same time, I've always been sure that keeping a distance (both physically and emotionally) is exactly that very same thing that has preserved me from catastrophe and disaster, in a life fraught with all sorts of perils.
I think it's half a dozen of a good thing, six of a bad thing.
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I don't think it is a "mental" problem - more of a neurological/sensory issue.
http://www.bacb.com/
Take some classes online Frank. It will open an entire world of understanding for you.
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My speech is as slow, flat, and wide as the Platte River; there are no hesitations, no stuttering, no stammering, no lisping; every single word is utterly distinct and separate. It's only that it's slow. I think the "average" person usually talks something like 200 words a minute; mine is circa 40 words a minute. (I could be wrong on the exact number; all I know for sure is that my speech "registers" only one-fifth as fast as "normal" speech.)
Well damn...Who knew...Franks a southerner... :-)