I'm going to Gabe Automotive to have my tires torqued, and then going into Nester’s on the way home. But then, you see, I had a nap. It was more a deep, deep sleep. I had only five hours rest/sleep Thursday night because of cramps in all my limbs. My ‘nap’ left me woozy for the rest of the day.
When I got up, I took Her Highness for a walk in Elder Cedar. And when we returned home, I cleaned and tidied the house in anticipation of Aidan’s visit today, and then I got into the spa for a good long soak under ominous skies. But once that lovely warm water and embraced me, all concerns were gone. It’s a blissful feeling to get into the water. I reckon it’s impossible to think about anything negative. It feels just too, too good to ruin with negative thoughts. I always close my eyes when I get in. It relaxes me instantly.
Back on land, it was time to feed the pets and then make my dinner and install myself on the chaise. Yesterday felt like a recovery day. I went to Eoin and François’ place knowing that I was going to meet their friends who are neighbours, but I did not anticipate the effect that they’d have on me.
I’m fluent with E&F, I have been for years. But on Thursday night, I spoke quite well at times, but it was hard. Plus, it embarrassed me deeply to speak rather well with E&F but pretty badly with Connie and Kyle. I want to explain why that was for fear of what they might think of me having such difficulty with them. But I couldn’t comfortably do that. I don’t want to take over the conversation to talk about myself. No thank you. Not when the subject is my mental health and about my symptoms. And not with strangers.
The anxiety I felt and the effort it took to speak is probably why I suffered so with cramps that night when I went to bed. That’s why yesterday felt like a reparation day. And today, Aidan comes. But with him, even though he’s a stranger, I feel totally comfortable because he knows and understands people who stutter. He’s our advocate, so I am unafraid. (More about him below.)
But first, the storm. Rain POUNDED down last night starting around 19:00. It was crazy in bursts, and normal in between the short-ish torrential downpours. Meanwhile inside, Ethel was curled up on the table in front of the fire, Fred was in the chair, close to the fire, and Sheba lay on the cool wood floor at the foot of the chaise. I love going to sleep when it rains.
Back to Aidan: I have two concerns that I want to talk to him about. One is AI-generated voice reception. I’m particularly concerned about the use of AIG voices in agencies, corporations and government. My second interest is the population of late-onset stutterers (LOS). It’s my concern that an enormous percentage of LOSs live without support and are unaware of devices and practices that can assist them with communication. These two things comprise my agenda for my talks today with Aidan. The issue that means most to me: LOSs.
I’ve found community and support in the stuttering community. I’m particularly grateful to STAMMA for forming a support group for LOSs. I want to grow the group, but I live in Vancouver and STAMMA is in London and serves the UK. But as I emerged from my breakdown and found my speech so, so badly broken, I never thought of myself as a stutterer/stammerer, and no one in the hospitals I went through ever used the word, “stutter.”
Once the doctors at Vancouver General diagnosed me as having a mental health problem I went home, BUT … I had my first appointment date with Dr. Shoja in hand. She didn’t label anything. I went through many words before I started calling my seizures by their correct name. Google was my greatest resource, so once you have the right name for my symptoms, I could do a lot of learning. And when Dr. S. diagnosed me with C-PTSD and FND. Google taught me much more.
One day I came upon a wonderful film on YouTube called Stutterer. Here’s what I wrote as a comment under the film:
This film changed my life. I thought of myself as having a bad speech impediment. No doctor or anyone used the word "stuttering" when speaking with me. I struggled for a couple of years when, due to a nervous breakdown, I lost my speech. Then I saw this film, and that led me to contacting stuttering organisations wherein I found community and a healing in my soul. I'm now a stuttering advocate working to make agencies and corporations aware of the impact of AI-generated voices have on the speech impaired. Bless you filmmaker, producers, distributors, New Yorker and YouTube for saving my soul and giving me a wonderful community to be part of.
I want to find partners to help me light a fire under stuttering organizations to create space for LOSs. And I’d love to work on publicity about LOSs in which we could alert medical and mental health professionals, and doctors whose patients lose their speech about the stuttering community where they can get emotional and practical support services.
It's a film for everyone. It’s brilliant and it’s short. Here a link.
•
This morning, there were several tributes to Jay on my Facebook feed. It was heartwarming to read the words of others who loved him, and I loved that one person posted photos of her together with Jay when he was young. I never knew him then, so it was fun to see young Jay.
I’ve already made laksa for lunch this morning, and soon I’ll walk Sheba, and then make a quick run into the village to go to the pharmacy. Then I’ll come home to wait for Aidan’s arrival. I’m very excited about meeting him.
No comments:
Post a Comment