Living life to the full celebrating cerebral palsy, speech and hearing impairments and using Augmentative and Alternative Communication AAC
Living life to the full celebrating cerebral palsy, speech and hearing impairments and using Augmentative and Alternative Communication AAC
I believe that dreaming, whether awake or asleep, comes from a place deep inside each of us.
Sparked by passion, unconscious wishes or a desire to achieve something special in life.
The aim was to share my personal views, experiences and opinions with specific spotlight areas relating to my lived experience of cerebral palsy (CP), dysarthria which creates speech and eating challenges, and a hearing impairment.
I’ve been thinking about the skills I needed for boccia at Tokyo 2020. Especially, how being a communication aid user helped me to achieve my dream of representing my nation internationally. I was questioning if boccia and AAC could be connected. I’ve used augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) since I...
When I started out employing personal assistants at the age of 12, as a family, we considered all of the different titles the role may be called from carer to support worker and personal support assistant. Speaking to friends who already had paid team members we settled for ‘personal assistant’...
Is it right or fair that a woman should be chosen to represent her nation over a male who has a better competitive track record? Boccia is a mixed gender sport, and definitely in England there are more male players than females. In 2018 the IPC and BISFed decided every...
Due to the pandemic I have been doing a lot of video conferencing with people I normally see in person. In face to face conversations some people understand my speech, and for spontaneity and speed my personal assistant often repeats what I’ve said verbatim. When I use my communication aid...
I’m sharing here events that interest me or where I have an active part to play. Let’s hope we all get back to ‘normal’ soon, but meanwhile please note there are plenty of digital events.
AAC Camp 30/31 July 2022 and Pre-conference workshops 30/31 July 2022. Main conference “Communication Beyond Borders” 1/8/22 to 4/8/22. For more information visit https://isaac-online.org/english/conference-2020/call-for-papers-2020/
You can read my latest blog here. All my posts are related in some way to my cerebral palsy, my speech impairment which I augment using AAC, and/or my hearing impairment.
Recently I had a very interesting conversation, which set me thinking. I’m 28 and I’m only now finding my feet when it comes to confidently communicating ‘verbally’. By this, I mean communicating with those who don’t know me, or who...
And, why wouldn’t I love Lucy? Lucy is my voice. She is what I sound like, both to others, and when I hear my voice. Most people don’t think about their voice, it’s just that, a part of them. Their...
I might look disabled to others, but as the saying goes don’t judge a book by its cover. Just because I’m surrounded every time we meet by technology does not mean I’m incapable of having a high-quality life. This month...
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