I’m feeling increasingly bad lately. Sometimes, I think we’re getting somewhere. I had a discussion with a woman from Het Loo Erf (centre for the blind) last week. She is a psychologist with the vocational rehab department (think you folks call it that in English). At first, I thought the discussion was going pretty well, but over the week I’ve been thinking about all that went wrong during the discussion. I have so much difficulty explaining my situation. And I so wish it were simple, like Mum often puts it. The folk called me back today saying that they wanted to do a further evaluation. She will get back to me tomorrow with details. I’m so scared that I’m way too complicated for these folks – cause even though I don’t expect magic from them, you never know what the folks think to be workable -, or, on the other hand, that these folks will think that the difficulties I’m concerned with are just imagined and I’m further just [misc. negative quality]. Oh well, I have at least one positive quality – last week this folk had the thing with qualities the folks at the summer programme had attributed to me, and she said I was definitely a go-getter (one of the qualities attributed to me). I am, but I’m getting weary of it and I’m wondering how long this go-getter part of my mind will be able to keep up.
The arrangements for next year are going horribly. My attempt to apply at the IBG website went wrong and only today we received an automatic E-mail saying they’d reply to the question (the site was down) in two days. Well, usually automatic E-mails are sent within a few seconds, so I wonder how many years it’ll take for the true reply to come. But basically I don’t quite care. I don’t want to apply at all. I have no idea of how to arrange all those things with the university and all remarks I get from folks are things like “I even know what to say to these people, and I ain’t even eighteen,” from my sister (so go ahead and tell me, instead of deflating me with your stupid remarks!), “You should just E-mail the director of studies,” from Mum (so what to put in that E-mail and where to address it?), and “Don’t other blind students face these same problems?” from Mr. De B. (even if they did, that wouldn’t mean I could settle them). I’m afraid nothing is coming out of it. I tried to explain my concern about the university stuff to the folk last week, but I failed miserably at it. Mr. De B. (who had initially contacted her and had a phone call with her on February 28) told her I’m worried about university, so she asked me why. I told Dad today that if they knew of a way to kick me to college, they could go ahead and do it. He said he didn’t plan to kick me to college. So what does he plan to kick me to? Out of the house, if I don’t make all the arrangements for college? Mum has always threatened to throw me out if I don’t go to university. Lately, she modified her expectation, stating that I should present her with a plan of what I was going to do over the year. I have no idea, but I don’t see how I can go to college, even if I magically acquired the knowledge and skills to arrange everything. It’s March, not even half a year before college is going to start. The director of studies will jump out of her skin when I call/E-mail her now. I’m so terrified of what is going to happen, and that even complicates the situation further. My folks don’t seem to understand that all this stuff is completely wearing me out.
Okay, so the first person among my relatives who reads this will get to me in fright urging me to hurry up and quickly arrange the college things before it’s too late. I want to scream: “If you folks want me to arrange my own stuff, then why the hell don’t you tell me how to do so?!!!” Maybe they don’t know how to help me with these things. Maybe therefore they tell me I should be independent. Maybe Mum and Dad and Sigrid just don’t have the answers they “even” claim to have. But my folks have never wanted to admit that kind of stuff. I remember the time in 1996, when they were seriously troubled with my behaviour. They had to get me services from the school psycyhologist. Now they dismiss the talk with the social worker in which this was determined to have been a discussion about me teasing another girl in the taxi (I did, together with two other kids, but none of the others were sent to the school psych). I remember the time in 1992 when I was transferred to special education, strangely enough on May 11, not at the end of the school year. I’ve always wondered why it was, and my parents have never given an answer beyond “You had to learn Braille,” (not till 1993) or “The school could only educate you if you would have Marianne for a teacher all the time,” (she would remain my Kindergarten teacher till the end of the year if I’d stayed there). In my memory, something happened in early 1992 that contributed to the decision (which had been made already for the two reasons mentioned above), but I cannot remember what it was. I feel my parents feel a bit ashamed of having to admit it’s not going that fine with me. I don’t care that they won’t acknowledge my issues at other times, but I do care that at this moment they’re so reluctant to acknowledge my difficulties. But I should be able to decide things for myself without my parents, to make my own plans, to present the detailed plan in a signed letter to my parents (hmmm, a bit exaggerated, but you know how I feel). I should be able to settle my own problems. I don’t even have the issues. I am a go-getter, at least, that’s what the go-getter part of my mind wants to define me as. And yet I cannot hold on. But a go-getter who can’t hold on isn’t a go-getter anymore. Sometimes, I so wish I could unite these perspectives. At times, I think I do this by trying to settle the issues, and at times, I think I might know some ways to do so. But how do I settle my issues and arrange stuff I have no idea about how to arrange at the same time?
Astrid
