Five-Star Disability

Hi folks:

… I must finish these blogs in one sitting!

I have been doing a lot of recent blogs on Deaf-Blind issues and intervenors. I need to cover all bases.  I am also an Ataxian.

What’s that?  That is a person who has ataxia.  Same as Canadian or the like…

Ataxia has many onsets, and various levels of severity.  I found this list and I have to say that I am textbook!  In fact, if you open the dictionary, and look at ataxia, I’d be very surprised if my picture was not there!

• impaired coordination in the torso or arms and legs.
  • Yes, I am often jerking left or right, up and down.  Standing I sometimes fall over for no reason, sitting I can do the same.  I do not actually fall, but I come close.
  • I often bend over to pick up a sock, and keep going in that general direction.
• frequent stumbling.
  • Surely, stumbling and whacking a car door is pretty dramatic.  Three hours in ER should do the trick, nothing is wrong!  I stumble over cracks in sidewalk and uneven pavement scars me.
• an unsteady gait.
  • I like that, instead of “drunken” gait, I can dodge and weave, jive, meander like an old river, and because my vision is pretty bad, I have no depth perception, iI often walk into things that seemed far, yet were close.
• uncontrolled or repetitive eye movements.
  • that too is a pickle, I seem unable to keep eye contact for long.  In Deaf Culture eye contact is an important part of interactions, yet I can’t seem to keep eye contact for long.
  • I use eyes to watch communication right, so with this uncontrollable eye movements, my eyes get tired and I tend to zone out.
• trouble eating and performing other fine motor tasks.
  • when eating, I might choke or cough or swallow small things… I’ve been known to cough, sneeze and laugh at the same time!
  • in terms of fine motor skills, yeah, that is proven.  using my new smartphone keyboard is a challenge, I truck around a wireless keyboard now.
  • And fingerspelling, spelling of words using manual alphabet in ASL, has become more sloppy if I am not concentrating on the word
  • My laptop has a touchpad for mouse navigation, I loath it!  Because I can’t always control the movements!  Blarg!
• slurred speech.
• vocal changes.
  • when I talk to my kids or wife, my formally strong clear voice sort of simmers and chokes, muttering out something that is not even recognizable!
• headaches
  • some of them can be weird, short, others long and winding!
• garbled thoughts (Craig adds…)
  • some thoughts are clear, then I can’t seem to focus on the topic again and I’ll be blah blah.  This is especially annoying when I’m trying to have a basic conversation with my wife, and my thoughts get jumbled up like a tumble dryer on high.

There we go, I am going to leave that for now.  Next topic, Vision on the subway…