Right so here's the story morning glory...
A note to the reader... I started out having this be a message to one of my blog friends from Open Diary, guide dog lists etc on facebook. However once I got started I couldn't stop and I passed the amount of words you are allowed in FB p.m.s a heck of a long time ago. I've been meaning to explain this bit in my blog anyway and rather than tell the story for the umpteenth oo Mr. Macky sais umpteenth is spelled right but Mackey is not. Huh? well anyway...
So I'm just going to copy all the gobs and gobs of text I have in the message box and transfer it to my blog so I can just tell folks to go read this thing in my blog. I don't mind telling it and I am planning to expand on some aspects of it but. For anyone who wants my back story for what it is worth. Go read it on the blog for yourself. smile.
On the 18 March at butt ass early a large number of armed FBI, local PD, U.S. marshels and customs Came into our house, yelling about a search warrent and more or less being loud. They didnt bust in with guns drawn, I don't think and they didn't, despite what some neighbor in the news paper said, kick the door in.
Anyway Scary scary stuff. Just thinking about it sends chills through me. Long and short of it is. They had reason to believe Larry had been producing having and trading child porn... They cought some guy in Aussi, down under, and he turnned over his contacts list and they tracked the ip first to the U.S., then to our service provider, then... To us. September first of last year somebody at yahoo on flicker saw some pix on Larry's account I guess. that weren't good. and they put a track on his our internet, his ip or whatever.
Well. If that wern't bad enough the pictures date back, as far as they can tell, to September of 08. The month my Benji was born. God... But wait! There's more! Act now! Larry. Was. using. Skye and Benji. In his nastyness. It's something I try not to think about. A two year and a new born? WTF! I just can't wrap my mind around it. I seen some of the pictures of Skye and Benji. There's this stupid befrigged assclown of a website that he posted to that *STILL* has the pictures up for whoever to see.
I'm ringing my aftercare caseworker Monday to see if maybe she can't do something or better yet tell me what I can do to get this horror off the net. I know they say once stuff is up on the net it's up there forever. Really? It sure would be nice if I could recover the countless number of pix, I've lost over the years. Well anyway...
They took everyone's cell phone and all the computers. Save for oddly enough mine.
They didn't take my iPhone. They didn't take my MacBook. They didn't take my T drive. They didn't take my video camera. I let look through all the pictures on my iPhone and told them those were all the ones on my computer. I told them I didn't let anybody touch my equipment as it is pretty much my main link to the outside world and means of communication. Larry must of made it clear that I a. had no clue what so ever about his actions and b. nobody other than me has ever touched my equipment. I had nothing to hide and was straight up with them.
My friend Shane said they didn't take my stuff because I was so straight with them and it was clear I had nothing to do with it.
I'm so thankful that I did have my stuff because I couldn't of fought the fight I needed for my kids without the iPhone and laptop. It sounds dramatic and dumb but it is what it is.
So here's my bit in all this. The house was horrid. I had got so depressed and numb by that point that I couldn't function well I could take care of my kids but the house had got quite away from me.
No one helped me keep the place up. They did some but it is like trying to clean up after a dog race with a tiny little poop bag.
The girls didn't listen to my rules and Larry didn't back me on having them. They ate all over the house, just threw their trash down, left food all up in the house. And while I tried to keep up best I could there always seemed to be heaps and heaps more, things I missed and all.
The basement was just aweful Larry had the basement and it was downright dangerous. It looked like a hell house that you would see on hoarders only about a thousand times worse. He didn't let the kids or I down and even if he did I would let them down there as it was just a big hot mess.
I told the cops, the SRS, that I tried, I really did, but I couldn't manage and nobody was helping enough to make a dent. It was some small comfort to know that when we went back in the house with the cops and the SRS they both admitted that it was clear I had been trying the best I could.
The house on it's own was enough for the state to yank Skye and Benji. I knew that and that was what I was always telling everyone. The state will take the kids if they saw. x,y,z...
Larry would not let me get any outside help. He disregarded suggestions from family about agencies that would be able to help me learn to manage everything. My main focus was on the kids. But with a house like that y'aknow. I claim it I am a crap house keeper. I can be a great house keeper but I had treaded water so long to try and do my best that I just drowned.
Well. There was the sex abuse and if the house had been perfect the state would of yanked the kids, as they should. I believe the state did the right thing by getting my kids up and out. I used the time they were in out of family foster care to get straight and figure out what we did next.
A few days after they went from protective custody from the cops and into their foster home their KVC caseworker called me and said she had to report an alert to the SRS abuse like as the kids had unexplained marks and brooses.
Later on I was told that the SRS suspected that the marks were burns. Burns? No one smoked who lived with us. The one friend who did always took it outside and never left her things down where the kids could get it...
The two or three things aginst me, the horrid house and neglect and sex abuse and all that they finally ruled unsubstanitated.
Larry has now been labled a child abuser, a sex offender, a child mulester is forbiden to be around children.
Thank. God for that.
Well as the kids were in care I hit the ground running even before our first time to go to court, just days after this happened I was already devising ways I could, with support at first mind my kids and give them shelter. I asked that the kids have educational screenings. Larry, well I'll get to that in time I guess. I had worries, especially for Benji. I also requsted that they be brought up to date on any shots and that Skye see a dentest. Which reminds me. I've got to ring gracemed and set up a time for her... Also gotta call their school and set up or find out where we can get a followup edcutional screening as requested...
Both kids were borderline well Skye was. Benji, as I had thought was very far behind in his speach and ability to well talk, which is redundent. Well when this happened I asked if there could be some way to teach him signs. And I started looking into special needs programs here in Wichita. I already knew the place I was going to seak help from first because I knew they helped disabled kids with delays. I knew and had a few friends from school that had received services from there. So they were my first call.
It took a little phone tag and some red tape but by early May I had secured services for Benji. What took for friggen ever is because infant toddler services, the ones who tested Benji took for ever getting their report out.
Additionally another of my first requests, and it might of been the one I said first. I requested that my babies get into counseling. Like yesterday. What they had gone through were going through was hell and I wanted to try and do as much as I could so they wouldn't be too messed up over it all. Skye got a few play therp. sessions before we came down here. I think they helped. God I hope so. Benji of corse was too young to test
After our first time in court and prior to any court orders being given I signed up for and did 24 hours of parenting classes. I set up therp for me up there and down here and know where I need to go if the kids ever do need help. I looked for housing options. right now we are living in my mom's house, my dad passed away in July... I got in touch or tried to and finally have with voc rehab again so I can get services through them. I was able just a few weeks ago to get us help with foodstamps, my aftercare worker has pushed for and received the green light for paying for Skye's preschool and ben's day school for the next year. Benji is receiving services twice a month at school, Rainbows comes in and works with him.
I even have a few options in mind if and when we need help with education, daycare whatever.
My question to SRS every time I met a case plan goal was what else can I do to help you help me and the kids? I even joined a support group for mom's who had their kids in care and it helped a lot.
On May 10th we went back for court to see what we did next. My parents were cleared to be kinship care for Skye and Benji meaning they would have custody sort of. The state holds over all custody for now. The D.A. was willing to accept the SRS ruling that I didn't hurt or abuse my kids. Rare in a lot of cases like this I've been told. Well at court the judged granted KVC, SRS children services contractor to place the kids with my folks and said that I could be there too but needed 100% supervision. I got it. To the black and white law side of things I failed to protect my kids. I needed to earn trust tha I could. So we went with it. My friends all got background clearence so me and the kids could get out and so they could drive us places we needed to go.
I'm in therp now and on meds. I've ditched the sleeping pills I was given in favor of OTC stuff and the anti deprecent helps.
My first real act of reclaiming my life was to ring GDB and make application for a third guide dog, Fleming having retired in August of last year.
I think my dog is going to be the thing that will let me feel confident and whole again and safe and will be the thing, it's not a thing but you know, that will pull us up out of this befrigged black hole Larry put us in.
In September we went back to court. This time it was to see if KVC could get the right to place the kids back with me and that the supervision thing be lifted... When the judge addressed me she said that I should be a postermom for how to do right by your children. Everyone is just impressed to heck and back over how far I've come. I, just didn't see any other option. I did the right thing.
Oh about the whole importance of the guide dog thing. Larry would not take me and the kids out. Last year for example we remained in the house from the day after thanks giving of last year until the second of feb this year. And this was normal. I took the kids on the deck and everything but as far as going out he said it was too much of a bother and I didn't need a third guide dog. He said I couldn't be trusted with the kids alone outside and he never walked the neighborhood. The girls did but they went such crazy paths I couldn't sort it out. Besides that I didn't have any way to get two kids outside and supervise them.
He sapped every last ounce of self-worth I had.
I didn't walk out because he told me he didn't care if I walked but I was never getting custody of the kids, he'd fight me in court. And he'd win. He'd make it look like I was unfit. Also I beleived in our family and that a child needs their mom and dad in the home. I also put his poor treatment of me off to he is just stressed out and everyone gets like that and takes it out on the close ones to them. He isn't abusing the kids, in the way of treating them bad or hitting them. He never ever hit me. Words hurt just as much. He had me thinking I was the crazy one and just you know sucked me out 'til there was nearly nothing.
He didn't restrict hwo I could talk to, I kept in touch with friends and family. I also didn't walk because I didn't want to come slinking back home with my kids to my folks. To me that was fail. No good. I had faith that things would get better and in a way I guess they did and are...
The same day I got my kids back Larry got nearly 22 years in federal prison. He has no visitation with any of his kids...He's manned up finally and is doing what little he can to see that the kids and I are supported. They get SSI checks via his SSDI and that is enough.
I'm not cutting his rights off or making a big hairy deal out it because if his rights went so would the checks. Besides that. What does it matter? He's effectively physically gone. For good.
You know, one thing some people get and others don't quite get is. I am not mad at him and I don't hate him. I hate I can't say how much, the things he did to our kids, I hate that he as so selfish that he didn't care he was at risk of and did losing his family. But I know there to be some good in him. I tell Skye and Benji that their dad did very bad things but he himself isn't a bad person. He's just ill and it makes him dangerous to be around us so he's in a place where he'll get help. It's like timeout for grownups.. The big bad grownup timeout cage. Skye, when you ask her, knows her daddy is in prison, only she says it prisonit and I think she's stopped confusing it with A. the hospital, or b. heaven which is the two places she thinks grandpa is currently.
I've told her and Benji none of this not one part of it is their fault. What was done to them was bad but they are not bad. I won't let anyone badmouth their dad infront of them and will never say anything bad on Larry.
Skye and Benji deserve to and have the right to come to their own ends regarding daddy. I'll tell them as much as I can in the way they can understand it. If, when they are of age, they want to see or write Larry I am behind that. If they want to write him off all together. I'm behind that too. He took away something from the kids he had no right to in that they and only they are to be the ones wo desides with whom they share their bodies. Not him. So to my way of thinking, he gets no rights to see them. I've agreeded to in time once I've healed more to keep at least a thread of contact with him, to tell him what the kids are doing but never detailed details. I do this because I hope in time Larry can answer for himself. I don't wish any harm upon him, but I know there'll be some.
What I wish for Larry is that he can go to a place where they have therp. and treatment program for people with his problems...I hope he gets the help he's needed all these long years and that he can put paid the hell he grew up in. I've learned several things now that explain so much but don't grant innocents. I hope and beleive he can change and learn how to cotrol his inpulses or whatever the hell it is that drives him to do this shit.
I hope that one day his side of things can come out and that he'll be able to take up his life such as it is and just. Live. Just to reach out to others who have been where he has been and help them get help or talk to abuse victims? I don't know. But I believe that from all of this can come a great good. But he's the only one who can make it happen. I beleive in him and that if he is true about wanting to change that he can. He can and hopefully will learn to control his sickness. He's never going to be cured. Never ever. But I send him all my best, lord only know that he's seen me at my worst... So bye bye larry and good luck to you. I've got life to attend to...
People say I was just as much a victim as the kids but in a different way... Maybe I *WAS* but refuse to be now. I'm not letting one bad event in my life define who I am or how my life is going to go. Right now I sometimes feel like I have to explain my back story and in time this too will pass.
I'm not going to look back. I'm going to do whatever it is I have to do so me and my kids "normal" is a good but different normal. They aren't victims any more either. This is part of their life but so is having blind parents, brown hor blonde, Skye and Benji respectively, hair or any other thing, sure this has marked us but it is only a small part of the big picture.
Today, thankfully. Skye and Benji show no signs of what they suffered at the hands of their dad, and to some extent me. I should of known. I should of been mentally stronger. I should of done up the house.
But it is what it is and that's all it is...
Skye and Benji have just blosemed now they are getting out into the world and learning and playing with kids their ages. Benji is signing and trying to talk more. The other night I gave him a bite of my soup. He wanted another so he tapped me and when I was looking at him and could see what he was doing he signed "more please." He even said it but it sounded like muh beeeeez. He is trying and he can say the named of some things and can find body parts eye ears like that They both seem to be moving on and that's what I'm doing. Like I said, We are no longer victims. rebuild, renew, recover! We will rise above this.
My plans are this... I'm waiting to get services going with Voc Rehab, they are slow and so I'm not expecting a heck of a lot now... But when I do get things going I want to get o and m training on the bus system here. I want to see everything old and new that will help me care for my kids. Things like a way to measure their medications. Keep track of them outside, currently I have a sighted friend go with me to the park or playground. I have supervised them in public but I've not done anything more than go for walks around the neighborhood... When I get my dog though we are gonna fly, er whatever you do when you ride the bus. Wait mostly, I guess as our transport here is suposed to suck?
Bassicly first things first I need to get my personal things in order. That's the foundation. Hopefully by the time I get back from GDB or soon there after I can start working on the whole job thing.
As I am rebuilding a new life I've desided to tell them all exactly what I want to do. I want to work with helper dogs. I think I could train the dogs that help wheel chair users and such and if I can do that grand. My true wish though is to work for GDB. I don't care what campus but to work there would be...
This may sound stupid but oh well... GDB is my favorite place in all the world. I just love the vibe there everyone is so positive. Oh I know there are things which will suck, or people I won't get on with or whatever, no place is perfect. But the times I was at GDB for training I felt respected and like a member of the human race, not a blind member, just a member. With a dog and with some special for lack of a word ways in doing things. I want to say alternitive but according to Mr. Macky, I name my macbook, that plus probily half the other words in this thing are not spelled correctly....
I'm happy there. I'm doing stuff I enjoy and am good at. I know I'm a good handler and with some training and knowledge maybe I could work in the kennels or in AGS or as an R.A. for the dorms when instructors or whoever aren't able to pull overnights. Not sure what I'd do with Skye and Benji but for now I have to focus on getting the training and knowledge and experence and what ever.
I've also got to prove to my mom something so epic that I wonder if I can do it. I have to prove I'm not a screwup she has said "I'm not gonna bail your ass out of california. If you move there you can't take your kids." Well I call bullshit on that. I get where she is coming from I really do, but I can do this and things like that just assuming it will go crap like everything else i my life does nothing but pull me down.
My other interest is oddly enough television or radio or something like that.
In the past I agreed to try and be a phone drone in a cube farm. It is something I could do, I've had some training in it and am good. But do I just want to get a job that will pay the bills but suck my life out or do I really as scary as it sounds want to try for what I really want? I want to try. May not get there or might end up some place I didn't think on but we are going to be fine. It will be hard and I'll be straight about it. Times this whole befrigged thing just sucks but you get good days for the bad days and I have to have faith that it's going to get better, that our lot in life is going to get better. I gotta do it, I'm the only parent my kids have and they are the spark for all I do and will ever do.
I wouldn't be here though if it wern't for my family. Despite some of their rather bummer qwerks, they have stepped up and taken us in and support us, they've been great and I am lucky to have them. Some days are better than other but sometimes that just how it goes. And my friends. My blog friends and email support group friends this is support for stuff like guide dogs for the blind grads. and my FB friends. I may not know all of them in person but the ones who reached out to me with an encourage word or thought mean a lo to me and then there are those folk who have the rather questionible honor of actually knowing me in person. Some of them I can't see in person because they live too far away but they've all been wonderful and supportive and just. Wow. If it wern't for them I would not be where I am now.
This is going to sound dumb but music also got me through. Ben Folds and Sufjan Stevens mostly with some coldplay and soul coughing and about a zillion other bands.
Oh totally random, silly random brain of mine. The girls. Well I wish I knew better how they are. I keep in touch with them on FB and I share as many pix as I can and messages and I will do what ever I have to to keep them in some contact with Skye and Benji. They miss us and God how I miss them. No matter what they are always going to be my girls.
Second random but not as random as thought number one... uh oh right My silly stupid favorite just for fun wish is to actually meet Mr. Ben Folds. Just to tell him thanks for all the music. The good times nad the bad. He and Ben Folds Five have been a part of the soundtrack, a big part of the soundtrack of my life for years and has seen me through some friggen hard times. And I just want to thank him. Ya know... And no I am not a demented dangerous stocker. I wouldn't do things like shreak and throw underthings at him or try to get some clothes off him or whatever those fans that do that stuff do. Look I admire him a hell of a lot. But really. He's just a guy, like everyone else and it is really weird to my way of thinking to do things like collect thousands of pictures of him off the internet. Googlemap where he lives, send him a ginormous amount of tweets on twitter or P.M.s on FB though I follow him both places, I guess the digital version of all those dead heads. Are they still around? I guess so. There are hoards of Elvis fans that go crazy over elvis and he's been dead, God what. 33 yeare? I was about eight months old in August of 77 so I don't remember...
Anyway, Okay I'll admit, Ben Folds provides many of my ringtones on my iPhone and... I do have a raggedy old torn and stained T shirt Larry got for me the one and ounly time I saw Ben Folds in person.
That was crap! They sold out of Ben Folds ture shirts faster than a teenager texting down the freeway at some ungoddly speed. You would think. Oh we have x number of ticket sales or wher ever we are playing has blah number of people so we should have at least whatever number of shirt plus extras but I guess hossin that stuff all over the place is hard. So I got a Rockin' the Suberbs T which is fitting cuz that was the CD I played over and over and over and over when Larry asked me out. I still regard that as a good time. I'll post about how we met and ll for anyone who wants to know Right now however it is two in the morning and despite it being a long day the kids will still be up way too early of a Sunday and gotta get some rest...
07 March through 26 March 2011. Follow my ups, downs and all arounds as part of CA class 720 Guide Dogs for the Blind, Inc San Rafael, California www.guidedogs.com While I train with my 3rd guide dog.
Showing posts with label Blindness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blindness. Show all posts
24.10.10
8.10.10
State of Kansas, blinded by saving money cuts closes services to state's blind.
While trying to look up those documents that told about my ex V.R. worker and the rehab center I cam across this aritcle by Phol Anderson of the Capatol Journal. What follows is the article and my comments. Tell me what you all think?
From CJonline
(Topeka Capitol Journal)
http://cjonline.com/news/local/2010-09-25/closure_deepens_the_darkness
Closing of Topeka facility leaves blind patrons searching, waiting for promised help elsewhere
by Phil Anderson
25 Sepber 2010
In the months before a state-run center for the blind closed earlier this year in Topeka, the Rev. Derrick Hall was receiving training there on how to cope with a sudden loss of sight that was brought on about two years ago by detached retinas.
Life skills, computer usage, learning to use a white cane while walking and reading in Braille were among areas in which he was receiving training.
But before he could complete his training, the Kansas Vocational Rehabilitation Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired, near S.W. 1st and MacVicar on the former grounds of Topeka State Hospital, was closed.
State officials said community-based services for the blind soon would be in place at locations across the state, allowing recipients to receive training closer to their homes — and not have to move to Topeka for several months or longer.
from me: Remember this bit about not having to travel to BFE to obtain needed services and training… You’ll read why later
on down the article.Nearly six months after the Topeka facility closed, the 52-year-old Hall is still in Topeka, waiting for community-based services.
"They said it would be better with the community-based services," the soft-spoken Hall said.
“"But so far, nothing has happened."
from me: …And this comes as an earth shattering shock? Nice to see the state of Kansas is as ass backwards and slow now as it was back when I first started receiving services through Voc. rehab over fifteen years ago.
Officials with the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services said the agency is in the process of awarding bids to providers of services to the blind and visually impaired. SRS expects to announce the first providers in the next couple of weeks.
However, to date, no community-based services are in place.
from me: What? They’re still trying to get bids for services despite the RCB being closed? Really? Why in the bloody hell wasn’t this all a done deal prior to closing the center?
Hall said after the Topeka facility closed, he could have returned home to Leavenworth, where he was an associate minister at Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church before he lost his sight.
Instead, he said, he opted to remain in the capital city after he began volunteering as a chaplain and front-desk worker at the Topeka Rescue Mission, 600 N. Kansas Ave. He also assists at St. John African Methodist Episcopal Church, 701 S.W. Topeka Blvd.
Each person with blindness or visual impairment receiving services from the state has a different story to tell. For Hall, his blindness developed over a short period — a matter of a couple of weeks.
"It did occur pretty rapidly," Hall said. "I knew I was having problems. I was getting ready to go to the doctor one morning and I couldn't see. I was unable to read. That was the first thing that went. Then the TV — I couldn't see it."
Hall had three surgeries for his detached retinas, "but none of them were successful," he said. All he can see now are "shadows."
He met with a vocational rehabilitation counselor in the Kansas City area regarding his options.
"He told me about the blind center in Topeka and asked me if I'd be interested," Hall said. "So, the following December of the same year — 2008 — I decided I'd go there."
Hall said he actually was at the center from March 2009 to March 2010 — "just shy of a year." The time was well spent, he said.
"It taught me a lot of things," Hall said. "It taught me to be independent. I was trying to do things on my own before I came, but I just didn't know how to do them. They were giving me those tools I needed."
In addition to learning mobility skills, Hall said he was being taught how to identify and select his clothes, how to cook and how to read Braille. He also was being trained in computer skills.
Then, around September 2009, rumblings started that the Topeka blind center was going to close. At first, he said, he and the others at the center were told the closure likely would take two years, and they would be long gone by then, with their training complete.
from me” Yeah right, don’t hold your breath
In short order, he said, he heard the facility would be closed in six months. Then three months. And finally, this past February, in 30 days.
from me: Funny how the state can be slow as hell when they have to put forth an effort to help people who are in dear need of services but can leap right into action when the outcome is to their , the state’s benefit.
It became obvious to Hall he would be out on his own before he mastered the skills he was learning.
"It closed before I reached the level I wanted to reach," he said.
from “me this is a sad story told many times. I know of several ex clients who complained of the same thing, leaving the program before they ever reached the level of skills they needed. Perhaps this is a reason there has been a history of revolving clients that come and go? I was one. They’d teach me enough to get by with the vision I had but not what to do, or having taught me what to do, not giving me enough self confidence to strike out on my own.
My plan was to move out of the residential program because I felt capable of doing the domestic tasks, but I still needed a lot of help with the computer and Braille."
He said five people were at the Topeka residential facility, which was open 24/7, at the time it shut down. About 15 employees at the center lost their jobs when the center closed, officials said.
from me: This is par for the corse… Clearly the state is more interested in their dear little budget that they can’t manage properly in the first place to give a fuck about who is going to be jobless or what people are meant to do in regards to being as independent as possible. It would seem to me that the state forgets that their actions impact… *gasp* real people!
for services…
Today, Hall said, he has $7,000 in computers that are gathering dust, waiting for him to be properly trained.
from me: Money management at it’s finest… Way to go Kansas! Thousands of dollars in equipment but neglect to properly train them on the use of same .
"They said, 'Don't worry, we're going to have more services set up in the community and you'll probably be better off,' "
from me: more bullshit from the state.Grab your rubber boots and grab a shovel… It’s about to get deep.
Hall said. "But since I've left, there's been nothing. No services whatsoever."
from me:here are a few words to watch out for if the state is telling youabout something that impacts your life. “don’t worry” reads worry yourself into an nervous break down. . “probily” reads “not bloody likely”. Also if the state is putting things in an “in the future” frame of mind it means they don’t have shit in place and are still in the brainstorming planning of whatever it is. As whatever services you were depending on will take ages and ages to resurface.
When the Kansas Vocational Rehabilitation Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired opened in 1939, Helen Keller was the featured speaker.
For years, the center was located near S.W. 6th and MacVicar, on the extreme southeast portion of the former Topeka State Hospital grounds.
from me: Ah hah! that explains a hell of a lot. I wondered if there was ever a connection between RCB and TSH. .
It wasn't uncommon for passers-by to encounter blind and visually impaired people who were learning to walk with a white cane.
Then, in the late 1990s, Topeka State Hospital closed, signalling changes were in store for the rehab center for the blind, as well.
The Legislature required SRS to develop a new center that didn't include a workshop as a training center, as the previous facility had done.
A new training center was developed near S.W. 1st and MacVicar. The center included a dormitory where people receiving services could stay.
from me: Again money management at it’s finest. That newly built building that cost God knows how much, was in the process of being mostly finished. They were still building the dorm part when I was last there. That was in 02… meaning this building is not even ten years old yet. Now it’s just closed? Epic fail
.Changes continued, some having to do with funding restrictions. Only blind or visually impaired people who were interested in vocational and rehabilitation training would be eligible for services. That meant only those who planned to use their skills in the work force could receive services at the rehab center.
from me: Planing to work is good, however as anyone knows within the blindness community jobs are as hard to find as hin’s teeth. So what then? Even more money fartted away? And WTF cutting out a majority of the client population that could be served? The highest numbers of newly blinded are people who are at retirement age anyway. So if grandma needs to learn self care living skills, she’s got to be willing to work? Where? Mac Donnalds? And I bet the state would get grandma thousands of dollars of equipment but not help in finding her a job training in how to use it? Look. To my way of thinking this is very narrow minded. Not everyone wants to work, especially if they’ve retired. Grandma just wants to get about on her own, cook and clean and read.
There should be a choice. What are newly blinded older persons or those who, for whatever reason aren’t planning joining the workforce supposed to do? Sit around and collect social security, become locked in a back bedroom and forgotten about? Come on people this isn’t the day of warehousing our disabled family members just because we don’t want to deal with them. We have gone past that. This is a regression in the making.
community based services have been around for a number of disabled populations for years and years. Why o why RCB and the state of Kansas failed to see what these other community services were set up is beyond me..
”As a result, the number of people receiving services at the rehab center dropped from about 80 people per year to around 20.
from me: Uh. ya’think? That normally happens when you, o IDK cut out a majority of the population served! Wonder how many thousands of dollars the state spent hiring someone to figure that little tidbit out?
"The cost of the facility and serving that many people was pretty high," said Michael Donnelly, director of rehabilitation services for SRS. "It just got out of control."
from me: Yeah just like the insanity of not only cutting a majority of the population you serve? or closing down the center prior to getting every in place for community based services? Insanity is ramped. look out!
The cost to the state: about $20,000 per person per month.
The budget for the Topeka-based Rehabilitation Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired in fiscal year 2010, the last year of its operation, was $1,244,329.
Ultimately, the recommendation was made to shutter the rehab center for the blind in Topeka and have its services provided by private contractors in communities across the state.
The Facilities Closure and Realignment Commission Report, released in November 2009, projected that SRS would save $73,275 in state general funds and $344,015 in all funds by closing the Topeka blind center. The report further stated that "resources can be shifted to provide more services to a greater number of people without them having to travel great distances."
from me. This is stupid thinking at it’s finest. To save money you cut out a large portion of the clients who could use your help. Please tell me, how many of thousands of dollars will now be under even more strain when the blind who can’t access your services have to depend on AFDC, medicaid, food stamps, leap and other support services for poor people or those who are under employed. because of lack of timely and effective training. This is just like sweeping the ginormous pile of dog barf under the rug it’s out of sight, and thus becomes someone els’s problem.
The budget for new community-based services is $1.3 million over two years.
Donnelly said recently that SRS "wasn't at a place yet where we can announce who the successful bidders are" to provide services to the blind and visually impaired. "But we feel pretty good about the proposals we've got. It's going to increase our capacity and ability to serve people in their home community."
from me: again, this should go without saying… But I’m saying it anyway. WHY! Whty don’t they have the contracts in place? Why don’t they have the services in place? Feeling good about putting something off and off is grand, as long as it isn’t you who are depending on these services. Am I the only one here who thinks this is all kind of wrong?
The proposals being considered stipulate that bidders give SRS a plan that would serve people so they wouldn't have to travel more than one day to receive services, including going back home the same day. In essence, services would be offered within two hours of a person's hometown.
Such an arrangement, he said, would be "particularly helpful to those who are in the four corners of the state," Donnelly said.
Orientation and mobility training offered by the state could increase by 50 percent to 60 percent under the new arrangement, Donnelly said.
Vocational and rehabilitation training will target working-age people who want a job.
Donnelly said he believed those who were able to work should seek jobs. He said work is "important" and helps those who are employed feel as though they are "a full member of the community."
Rather than locking funds into the fixed costs of operating a training and residential facility that had "limited consumer demand," SRS officials said funds are being invested in developing and offering an enhanced scope of services at the community level.
The community-based model, SRS officials said, results in local access to services leading to competitive, integrated employment; assistive technology services; and independent living resources.
from me: I think I’m about to have a major break with reality and become quite insane. Let. me. say. this. as. best. i. can. What are people meant to do if they need and want services provided by your program but because of their wanting to work or not they may be turnd away? Working is good. If you can get it. You could have gobs and gobs and gobs of training, but that doesn’t mean you’ll get a job. The 70 to 75% une/under employment rate among working age blind tells me, lack of training on the blind person’s part, while playing a part in the job or no job. What counts more is the sighted people’s misconception of blindness and blind people. Yeah there is the ADA but the person not hiring you because of your blindness isn’t going to come straight out and say this. They’ll make up any reason, and you can bet there is no way to test if that reason is for real or just a ploy covering up the real reason.
Additionally, achieving a happy fulfilling life doesn’t always come as a perk once you join the work force. There are several other ways. more important than all that happy fuzzy Mr. Rogers, crap about feeling good is covering the most basic needs, food decent shelter, dependable transport. It is much much harder to get a job if you don’t have these basic things in place and if you try skipping over them and gr straight for the job, and meet with failure, that’s going to do a number on self worth and you’ll just stay stuck of state assistance thinking you are not worthy or able to work. Being rejected enough times does this to everyone I’d bet.
Officials stressed that vocational rehabilitation services for people who are blind or visually impaired continue to be provided statewide through local SRS service centers. These services haven't been affected by the closure of the blind center in Topeka. In fiscal 2010, 615 people who are blind or visually impaired received vocational and rehabilitation services at a cost of just over $1 million.
In addition, SRS officials said, "for the few consumers who may need access to intensive facility-based services, provider agreements have been negotiated with in-state and out-of-state organizations." SRS officials said such services may be funded through vocational rehabilitation dollars for eligible people.
from me: Wait! I think that they may of condricted themselves. On one hand you want to keep people in their home community but on the other hand you want to send some people out of state? What the fuck! Sending people out of state to places like the Colorado Center for the Blind cost more per person than instate residential training I would bet so WTF do you have to say about that?
Not everyone is excited about the proposed changes to a community based-only model for services for the blind and visually impaired.
from me: Preposed? give me a break. preposed means you haven’t taken any action on something yet and are trying to read how people react to an idea. This is past the preposed stage. They’ve already closed down the center so it is now in the action phase, right? Or am I just smoking too much crack?
Michael Byington, chief executive officer for the Kansas Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired, 603 S.W. Topeka Blvd., said he believed there was a place for a residential facility, like the one that closed earlier this year
from me. Right on Mr Byington! We need a choice in how we learn to conduct our lives as blidnd people regardless if it was blind at birth or newly blinded. We need to have access to the training style that best fits our needs. Why must we have an either or sort of deal?in Topeka, as well as community-based services.
"I don't want to choose," Byington said. "I say we need both."
He said some blind or visually impaired people learning skills do so "more efficiently" when they are in a residential facility, where overly protective friends and family aren't around to do things for them.
For those who remain in their homes, he said, services may be offered only a few hours a week. Under such an arrangement, it likely will take far longer for them to learn skills,
:Byington said.
from meThis is why I’m not setting any sort of time line up for my receiving home based services and finding a job. I have no clue how long it is going to take, if this stuff isn’t even off the ground, I may be collecting old persons benefits before they get it all up nad going.
He said he and his organization have been "trying to do what we can to replace what's been lost."
Byington questioned the state and federal government focusing on those who want to go back to work, saying it leaves out others who also could be in dire need of services.
He gave an example of a mother in her 30s who lost her vision, with three young children at home.
"Her immediate need was rehabilitation so she could take care of her children," Byington said.
The woman was able to get some training, but only by virtue of saying she would be willing to seek work, he said.
Older adults who lose vision as a result of diabetes or people with eye diseases, such as macular degeneration, may not be eligible for services. Byington said he expects to see more people with serious vision problems because of a rise in medical conditions, such as diabetes, as well as an increase in the number of people who survive head injuries.
Byington said state officials formerly kept tabs on the number of people who were blind in Kansas. The highest number ever recorded was 6,000, he said. Yet, Byington said, the number should have been closer to 40,000 and 50,000.
The state stopped counting the blind in the late 1980s.
With current budget cuts, Byington said, information is difficult to come by for people who are blind or have visual impairment and are seeking services.
The state's referral and information line for the blind and visually impaired has been shut down, Byington said.
from me: Oh! shock! What? The state can’t count the number of blind people properly??? Wow who’d of thought? And bloody hell what are people supposed to do if they can’t get any services at all? There really should be some way to provide in-home programs or socializing programs for older blind persons, communities could have community centers. Take some of us unemployed younger folks and let us staff the community centers we could teach our own. So to speak. C’mon there has to be a way to make sure everyone regardless of wanting to work or not to get a way to get the help they need to live happyfullingl lives. His agency is left as the only toll-free phone number for people to call for information regarding blindness and visual impairment in Kansas, he said. The number is (800) 799-1499.
Ann Byington, wife of Michael and president of the Kansas Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired, said the organization continues to seek services that will meet the needs of the state's blind and visually impaired population.
"We're going to move on, because we have to," she said. "We know in our own organization, we have to get the parents of young people involved, so they'll know who did the work to get things in place for them."
from me: Damn straight. You’re bang on. It just might come to a case of if the state refuses, for whatever reason,, refuses to provide services to a person just because they haven’t a job as their goal, that we’ll just have to do it ourselves, like I said up there. Staff neighborhoods with centers, who best to teach a blid person how to do something? Let another blind person teach them.
Move forward, don’t look back.
Phil Anderson can be reached at (785) 295-1195 or phil.anderson@cjonline.com
Closing thoughts.
I knew the state couldn’t manage things worth a tinkers damn. That rehab center just didn’t work for me. But for some it did. Despite my dislike of that feces place, I still think some services that would be dependable are better than nothing. I fear the state is blind to the needs of the blind and we’re going to be the ones to suffer for it.
From CJonline
(Topeka Capitol Journal)
http://cjonline.com/news/local/2010-09-25/closure_deepens_the_darkness
Closing of Topeka facility leaves blind patrons searching, waiting for promised help elsewhere
by Phil Anderson
25 Sepber 2010
In the months before a state-run center for the blind closed earlier this year in Topeka, the Rev. Derrick Hall was receiving training there on how to cope with a sudden loss of sight that was brought on about two years ago by detached retinas.
Life skills, computer usage, learning to use a white cane while walking and reading in Braille were among areas in which he was receiving training.
But before he could complete his training, the Kansas Vocational Rehabilitation Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired, near S.W. 1st and MacVicar on the former grounds of Topeka State Hospital, was closed.
State officials said community-based services for the blind soon would be in place at locations across the state, allowing recipients to receive training closer to their homes — and not have to move to Topeka for several months or longer.
from me: Remember this bit about not having to travel to BFE to obtain needed services and training… You’ll read why later
on down the article.Nearly six months after the Topeka facility closed, the 52-year-old Hall is still in Topeka, waiting for community-based services.
"They said it would be better with the community-based services," the soft-spoken Hall said.
“"But so far, nothing has happened."
from me: …And this comes as an earth shattering shock? Nice to see the state of Kansas is as ass backwards and slow now as it was back when I first started receiving services through Voc. rehab over fifteen years ago.
Officials with the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services said the agency is in the process of awarding bids to providers of services to the blind and visually impaired. SRS expects to announce the first providers in the next couple of weeks.
However, to date, no community-based services are in place.
from me: What? They’re still trying to get bids for services despite the RCB being closed? Really? Why in the bloody hell wasn’t this all a done deal prior to closing the center?
Hall said after the Topeka facility closed, he could have returned home to Leavenworth, where he was an associate minister at Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church before he lost his sight.
Instead, he said, he opted to remain in the capital city after he began volunteering as a chaplain and front-desk worker at the Topeka Rescue Mission, 600 N. Kansas Ave. He also assists at St. John African Methodist Episcopal Church, 701 S.W. Topeka Blvd.
Each person with blindness or visual impairment receiving services from the state has a different story to tell. For Hall, his blindness developed over a short period — a matter of a couple of weeks.
"It did occur pretty rapidly," Hall said. "I knew I was having problems. I was getting ready to go to the doctor one morning and I couldn't see. I was unable to read. That was the first thing that went. Then the TV — I couldn't see it."
Hall had three surgeries for his detached retinas, "but none of them were successful," he said. All he can see now are "shadows."
He met with a vocational rehabilitation counselor in the Kansas City area regarding his options.
"He told me about the blind center in Topeka and asked me if I'd be interested," Hall said. "So, the following December of the same year — 2008 — I decided I'd go there."
Hall said he actually was at the center from March 2009 to March 2010 — "just shy of a year." The time was well spent, he said.
"It taught me a lot of things," Hall said. "It taught me to be independent. I was trying to do things on my own before I came, but I just didn't know how to do them. They were giving me those tools I needed."
In addition to learning mobility skills, Hall said he was being taught how to identify and select his clothes, how to cook and how to read Braille. He also was being trained in computer skills.
Then, around September 2009, rumblings started that the Topeka blind center was going to close. At first, he said, he and the others at the center were told the closure likely would take two years, and they would be long gone by then, with their training complete.
from me” Yeah right, don’t hold your breath
In short order, he said, he heard the facility would be closed in six months. Then three months. And finally, this past February, in 30 days.
from me: Funny how the state can be slow as hell when they have to put forth an effort to help people who are in dear need of services but can leap right into action when the outcome is to their , the state’s benefit.
It became obvious to Hall he would be out on his own before he mastered the skills he was learning.
"It closed before I reached the level I wanted to reach," he said.
from “me this is a sad story told many times. I know of several ex clients who complained of the same thing, leaving the program before they ever reached the level of skills they needed. Perhaps this is a reason there has been a history of revolving clients that come and go? I was one. They’d teach me enough to get by with the vision I had but not what to do, or having taught me what to do, not giving me enough self confidence to strike out on my own.
My plan was to move out of the residential program because I felt capable of doing the domestic tasks, but I still needed a lot of help with the computer and Braille."
He said five people were at the Topeka residential facility, which was open 24/7, at the time it shut down. About 15 employees at the center lost their jobs when the center closed, officials said.
from me: This is par for the corse… Clearly the state is more interested in their dear little budget that they can’t manage properly in the first place to give a fuck about who is going to be jobless or what people are meant to do in regards to being as independent as possible. It would seem to me that the state forgets that their actions impact… *gasp* real people!
for services…
Today, Hall said, he has $7,000 in computers that are gathering dust, waiting for him to be properly trained.
from me: Money management at it’s finest… Way to go Kansas! Thousands of dollars in equipment but neglect to properly train them on the use of same .
"They said, 'Don't worry, we're going to have more services set up in the community and you'll probably be better off,' "
from me: more bullshit from the state.Grab your rubber boots and grab a shovel… It’s about to get deep.
Hall said. "But since I've left, there's been nothing. No services whatsoever."
from me:here are a few words to watch out for if the state is telling youabout something that impacts your life. “don’t worry” reads worry yourself into an nervous break down. . “probily” reads “not bloody likely”. Also if the state is putting things in an “in the future” frame of mind it means they don’t have shit in place and are still in the brainstorming planning of whatever it is. As whatever services you were depending on will take ages and ages to resurface.
When the Kansas Vocational Rehabilitation Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired opened in 1939, Helen Keller was the featured speaker.
For years, the center was located near S.W. 6th and MacVicar, on the extreme southeast portion of the former Topeka State Hospital grounds.
from me: Ah hah! that explains a hell of a lot. I wondered if there was ever a connection between RCB and TSH. .
It wasn't uncommon for passers-by to encounter blind and visually impaired people who were learning to walk with a white cane.
Then, in the late 1990s, Topeka State Hospital closed, signalling changes were in store for the rehab center for the blind, as well.
The Legislature required SRS to develop a new center that didn't include a workshop as a training center, as the previous facility had done.
A new training center was developed near S.W. 1st and MacVicar. The center included a dormitory where people receiving services could stay.
from me: Again money management at it’s finest. That newly built building that cost God knows how much, was in the process of being mostly finished. They were still building the dorm part when I was last there. That was in 02… meaning this building is not even ten years old yet. Now it’s just closed? Epic fail
.Changes continued, some having to do with funding restrictions. Only blind or visually impaired people who were interested in vocational and rehabilitation training would be eligible for services. That meant only those who planned to use their skills in the work force could receive services at the rehab center.
from me: Planing to work is good, however as anyone knows within the blindness community jobs are as hard to find as hin’s teeth. So what then? Even more money fartted away? And WTF cutting out a majority of the client population that could be served? The highest numbers of newly blinded are people who are at retirement age anyway. So if grandma needs to learn self care living skills, she’s got to be willing to work? Where? Mac Donnalds? And I bet the state would get grandma thousands of dollars of equipment but not help in finding her a job training in how to use it? Look. To my way of thinking this is very narrow minded. Not everyone wants to work, especially if they’ve retired. Grandma just wants to get about on her own, cook and clean and read.
There should be a choice. What are newly blinded older persons or those who, for whatever reason aren’t planning joining the workforce supposed to do? Sit around and collect social security, become locked in a back bedroom and forgotten about? Come on people this isn’t the day of warehousing our disabled family members just because we don’t want to deal with them. We have gone past that. This is a regression in the making.
community based services have been around for a number of disabled populations for years and years. Why o why RCB and the state of Kansas failed to see what these other community services were set up is beyond me..
”As a result, the number of people receiving services at the rehab center dropped from about 80 people per year to around 20.
from me: Uh. ya’think? That normally happens when you, o IDK cut out a majority of the population served! Wonder how many thousands of dollars the state spent hiring someone to figure that little tidbit out?
"The cost of the facility and serving that many people was pretty high," said Michael Donnelly, director of rehabilitation services for SRS. "It just got out of control."
from me: Yeah just like the insanity of not only cutting a majority of the population you serve? or closing down the center prior to getting every in place for community based services? Insanity is ramped. look out!
The cost to the state: about $20,000 per person per month.
The budget for the Topeka-based Rehabilitation Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired in fiscal year 2010, the last year of its operation, was $1,244,329.
Ultimately, the recommendation was made to shutter the rehab center for the blind in Topeka and have its services provided by private contractors in communities across the state.
The Facilities Closure and Realignment Commission Report, released in November 2009, projected that SRS would save $73,275 in state general funds and $344,015 in all funds by closing the Topeka blind center. The report further stated that "resources can be shifted to provide more services to a greater number of people without them having to travel great distances."
from me. This is stupid thinking at it’s finest. To save money you cut out a large portion of the clients who could use your help. Please tell me, how many of thousands of dollars will now be under even more strain when the blind who can’t access your services have to depend on AFDC, medicaid, food stamps, leap and other support services for poor people or those who are under employed. because of lack of timely and effective training. This is just like sweeping the ginormous pile of dog barf under the rug it’s out of sight, and thus becomes someone els’s problem.
The budget for new community-based services is $1.3 million over two years.
Donnelly said recently that SRS "wasn't at a place yet where we can announce who the successful bidders are" to provide services to the blind and visually impaired. "But we feel pretty good about the proposals we've got. It's going to increase our capacity and ability to serve people in their home community."
from me: again, this should go without saying… But I’m saying it anyway. WHY! Whty don’t they have the contracts in place? Why don’t they have the services in place? Feeling good about putting something off and off is grand, as long as it isn’t you who are depending on these services. Am I the only one here who thinks this is all kind of wrong?
The proposals being considered stipulate that bidders give SRS a plan that would serve people so they wouldn't have to travel more than one day to receive services, including going back home the same day. In essence, services would be offered within two hours of a person's hometown.
Such an arrangement, he said, would be "particularly helpful to those who are in the four corners of the state," Donnelly said.
Orientation and mobility training offered by the state could increase by 50 percent to 60 percent under the new arrangement, Donnelly said.
Vocational and rehabilitation training will target working-age people who want a job.
Donnelly said he believed those who were able to work should seek jobs. He said work is "important" and helps those who are employed feel as though they are "a full member of the community."
Rather than locking funds into the fixed costs of operating a training and residential facility that had "limited consumer demand," SRS officials said funds are being invested in developing and offering an enhanced scope of services at the community level.
The community-based model, SRS officials said, results in local access to services leading to competitive, integrated employment; assistive technology services; and independent living resources.
from me: I think I’m about to have a major break with reality and become quite insane. Let. me. say. this. as. best. i. can. What are people meant to do if they need and want services provided by your program but because of their wanting to work or not they may be turnd away? Working is good. If you can get it. You could have gobs and gobs and gobs of training, but that doesn’t mean you’ll get a job. The 70 to 75% une/under employment rate among working age blind tells me, lack of training on the blind person’s part, while playing a part in the job or no job. What counts more is the sighted people’s misconception of blindness and blind people. Yeah there is the ADA but the person not hiring you because of your blindness isn’t going to come straight out and say this. They’ll make up any reason, and you can bet there is no way to test if that reason is for real or just a ploy covering up the real reason.
Additionally, achieving a happy fulfilling life doesn’t always come as a perk once you join the work force. There are several other ways. more important than all that happy fuzzy Mr. Rogers, crap about feeling good is covering the most basic needs, food decent shelter, dependable transport. It is much much harder to get a job if you don’t have these basic things in place and if you try skipping over them and gr straight for the job, and meet with failure, that’s going to do a number on self worth and you’ll just stay stuck of state assistance thinking you are not worthy or able to work. Being rejected enough times does this to everyone I’d bet.
Officials stressed that vocational rehabilitation services for people who are blind or visually impaired continue to be provided statewide through local SRS service centers. These services haven't been affected by the closure of the blind center in Topeka. In fiscal 2010, 615 people who are blind or visually impaired received vocational and rehabilitation services at a cost of just over $1 million.
In addition, SRS officials said, "for the few consumers who may need access to intensive facility-based services, provider agreements have been negotiated with in-state and out-of-state organizations." SRS officials said such services may be funded through vocational rehabilitation dollars for eligible people.
from me: Wait! I think that they may of condricted themselves. On one hand you want to keep people in their home community but on the other hand you want to send some people out of state? What the fuck! Sending people out of state to places like the Colorado Center for the Blind cost more per person than instate residential training I would bet so WTF do you have to say about that?
Not everyone is excited about the proposed changes to a community based-only model for services for the blind and visually impaired.
from me: Preposed? give me a break. preposed means you haven’t taken any action on something yet and are trying to read how people react to an idea. This is past the preposed stage. They’ve already closed down the center so it is now in the action phase, right? Or am I just smoking too much crack?
Michael Byington, chief executive officer for the Kansas Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired, 603 S.W. Topeka Blvd., said he believed there was a place for a residential facility, like the one that closed earlier this year
from me. Right on Mr Byington! We need a choice in how we learn to conduct our lives as blidnd people regardless if it was blind at birth or newly blinded. We need to have access to the training style that best fits our needs. Why must we have an either or sort of deal?in Topeka, as well as community-based services.
"I don't want to choose," Byington said. "I say we need both."
He said some blind or visually impaired people learning skills do so "more efficiently" when they are in a residential facility, where overly protective friends and family aren't around to do things for them.
For those who remain in their homes, he said, services may be offered only a few hours a week. Under such an arrangement, it likely will take far longer for them to learn skills,
:Byington said.
from meThis is why I’m not setting any sort of time line up for my receiving home based services and finding a job. I have no clue how long it is going to take, if this stuff isn’t even off the ground, I may be collecting old persons benefits before they get it all up nad going.
He said he and his organization have been "trying to do what we can to replace what's been lost."
Byington questioned the state and federal government focusing on those who want to go back to work, saying it leaves out others who also could be in dire need of services.
He gave an example of a mother in her 30s who lost her vision, with three young children at home.
"Her immediate need was rehabilitation so she could take care of her children," Byington said.
The woman was able to get some training, but only by virtue of saying she would be willing to seek work, he said.
Older adults who lose vision as a result of diabetes or people with eye diseases, such as macular degeneration, may not be eligible for services. Byington said he expects to see more people with serious vision problems because of a rise in medical conditions, such as diabetes, as well as an increase in the number of people who survive head injuries.
Byington said state officials formerly kept tabs on the number of people who were blind in Kansas. The highest number ever recorded was 6,000, he said. Yet, Byington said, the number should have been closer to 40,000 and 50,000.
The state stopped counting the blind in the late 1980s.
With current budget cuts, Byington said, information is difficult to come by for people who are blind or have visual impairment and are seeking services.
The state's referral and information line for the blind and visually impaired has been shut down, Byington said.
from me: Oh! shock! What? The state can’t count the number of blind people properly??? Wow who’d of thought? And bloody hell what are people supposed to do if they can’t get any services at all? There really should be some way to provide in-home programs or socializing programs for older blind persons, communities could have community centers. Take some of us unemployed younger folks and let us staff the community centers we could teach our own. So to speak. C’mon there has to be a way to make sure everyone regardless of wanting to work or not to get a way to get the help they need to live happyfullingl lives. His agency is left as the only toll-free phone number for people to call for information regarding blindness and visual impairment in Kansas, he said. The number is (800) 799-1499.
Ann Byington, wife of Michael and president of the Kansas Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired, said the organization continues to seek services that will meet the needs of the state's blind and visually impaired population.
"We're going to move on, because we have to," she said. "We know in our own organization, we have to get the parents of young people involved, so they'll know who did the work to get things in place for them."
from me: Damn straight. You’re bang on. It just might come to a case of if the state refuses, for whatever reason,, refuses to provide services to a person just because they haven’t a job as their goal, that we’ll just have to do it ourselves, like I said up there. Staff neighborhoods with centers, who best to teach a blid person how to do something? Let another blind person teach them.
Move forward, don’t look back.
Phil Anderson can be reached at (785) 295-1195 or phil.anderson@cjonline.com
Closing thoughts.
I knew the state couldn’t manage things worth a tinkers damn. That rehab center just didn’t work for me. But for some it did. Despite my dislike of that feces place, I still think some services that would be dependable are better than nothing. I fear the state is blind to the needs of the blind and we’re going to be the ones to suffer for it.
22.9.10
Preamble or how I became a guide dog user
When I was 18 several things happened that changed my young life. For one I graduated with the class of '95 from Wichita High School West. We were, I guess as Wichita public schools go, a small graduating class, 142 walked across the stage at Century II on 30 May, 1995.
I was meant to go, had actually signed up for classes at Wichita State University in the fall, but as it turned out, I followed my heart and hard head and went to guide dog school instead.
I had been thinking about getting a guide dog for about two years. I figured sighted teenagers get cars, why not a blind teenager getting a guide dog? Independence is independence? Right? Right.
But, I wasn't mean at heart and knew subjecting a guide dog to the zoo that was public high school verged on mean, possibly abusive, for sure not putting the wellbeing of any dog that might guide me around first.
I first heard about guide dogs, I mean really heard about them, I had always just known that some blind people use the stick er um cane and others use dogs. Well. I was listening to a talking book that told all about these things about blindness. It had an entry for guide dog. When I heard the description floating up out of the tape player I was hooked.
I hated, still hate the stick. It was so. not cool. It made me look blind. And it just sucked. I didn't like going out with it. Even today as I wait for training with my third guide dog I hate going out with the blasted thing. It still is not cool and makes me look blind. To say nothing of it always getting stuck in cracks and jabbing me half to death. Gah!
Oh, there was a time that I thought the cane was cool. When I was 12 and at the extended school year program at the state school for the blind in Kansas City I thought canes were cool.
I had a nasty habbit of falling down steps, thinking they were flat ground. Or thinking shadows on the ground were dangerous pits, holes that I could trip on or fall into. When I came in from outside it took an age for my remaining useful eye to adjust to the change in lighting and I was for all intent and purposes completely blind. Same thing at night. I couldn't see my hand in front of my face, never mind trying to walk anyplace on my own hook.
I noticed that some students at KSSB, some who saw a lot better than I did, used canes. They did not fall down steps, trip over things, fear shadows or walking at night or in dimly lighted places.
I made up my mind. I had to have one of those canes. As all who know me well can tell you, once my mind is made up it is made up come hell or high water and if I want something enough I'll do whatever it takes to get it. Damn the challenges come what may.
I went to the travel instructor, having noticed a whole mess of white canes in a box in her office. I asked about getting one of those canes and how to use it. I told her more or less what I've said here. Blind in one eye and can't see out of the other... She gave me a cane to take to the dorm, not the one I'd end up with, just a test drive one to see what I thought. She said she'd see me that next afternoon for a lesson and to be fitted for the cane.
Oh! Happy day! No more bashing into things, falling down curbs, or up curbs for that matter, no more thinking shadows were waiting to swallow me whole. Yes yes yes!
That lasted exactly about four hours... That evening my folks called me. I was excited and told my dad. He... Said I didn't need a cane and would be taking one away from someone who needed it really and truly.
I thought about the huge heap of canes in the travel teacher's office and figured canes must come from someplace... If they needed more, I reasoned, they could just call the white cane factory or where ever the canes came from and just get more. It was the Kansas state school for the blind. Right? I did not tell my dad this.
I did however start to feel self-conscious...
I went for my lesson that next afternoon but found myself feeling like an elephant in a small room.
That next year I started to get travel training at school in Wichita. There was that damn cane again. And a teacher, several actually, who wanted me to use it. In public in front of God and everybody no less. Um erm? No.
I did all I could to not have to go to my weekly travel classes. Stayed home from school, forgot the cane, anything I could think of.
Travel classes filled me with fear and still make me uncomfortable. Going someplace strange alone for the first time? Yeah. I don't think so.
As time went on and I got to be a teenager my dislike for "that stick" grew and grew. I remember one day when I was in eighth grade that my V.I. teacher and travel instructor said I had to use the cane at home when I went out with my family. I had a huge non-folding cane with a huge ginormous marshmellow tip. A marshmellow tip is a huge blocky largeish marshmellow looking cane tip that's suposed to do something? muffle the shock of the cane getting stuck in cracks? I don't know. To my way of thinking it was the cherry on the look at me I'm a complete and utter looser cake.
My folks and grandparents Kennedy were going out to eat. Well so did I nad my brother and sister... I remember wanting to take the cane along just so my teachers at school would shut up about it and get off my back. But I was told "You don't need that cane, you have us."
This was my parents. There was no outranking them. So no cane.
It has only been very recently that my mom has encouraged me to bring my cane or, I'm guessing in future my new guide dog. This is a welcome change. If it had been like that when I was younger, I wonder if my life would of turned out different?
In the summer of 1994 I attended the college prep program at the rehab center for the blind, now closed, located in Topeka.
There were all kinds of things, braille, travel, that I didn't like. There were things, cooking and computers and my english 101 class at Washburn that I did like.
One thing that made the braille class more livible was the fact my instructor had a very very sweet yellow lab female. I was taken with the dog straight away and the instructor would let me stroke her dog at the end of the lessons. I asked a few questions about the dog, mostly though, just getting to pat her at the end of class was enough.
I started picturing my grown up adult self with some unnamed guide dog of my own. At that time I didn't have much of a clue as to where you got them or anything about them. I just figured dogs must be better than canes to get around with.
There was another instructor who ran several other classes and had a yellow lab male. She too answered my questions and allowed me to pet her dog. I knew to ask even without being told. It just made sense to me. I regarded people's guide dogs as an extention of themselves. I know I wouldn't like it if random people came up and started patting me without asking or warning so I figured others must feel like this as well.
Still, I think then the seeds of, madness were planted. I didn't give guide dogs much of a thought again until oh that next year, the summer straight after graduation...
I was back at the rehab center. There were the instructors too with labbies, male and female and then. To my joy a student. Who had a golden retriever female.
This new breed of guide dog was so, if you'll excuse the word choice, fetching. I had never seen a golden retriever. She was the most pretty dog I had ever lay eyes or hands to.
My student friend was also one of the kindest, sweeetest people I had ever met. I still remember fondly and have considered asking GDB, this is where her dog was from, GDB, Guide Dogs for the Blind, if they could put us in touch again.
I loved having a real live guide dog right there at the dorm. Unlike the instructors' dogs who I saw in "working" mode. I got to observe a guide dog team right around the clock.
My friend was awesome and not only explained about what went into caring for a dog, she even let me watch and sometimes help out. Never the feeding. I got to watch that but she was the only one who was allowed to feed or water her dog.
She also said having a dog ment getting up early or going out into the rain to take the dog out to do her business.
She told me about the school, GDB, she had received all her dogs from. That place sounded magical. I pictured blue sky day in and day out, palm trees, hippy-ish sort of out there laid back people. It sounded like the place for me. And, unlike the school in Kansas I had been looking into, everything was free. The trip out and back, the dog, the training, and, this was the thing to push me over the edge... They helped with medical expensis, leaving me to provide the dog food, grooming and other not hugely expensive things I knew I could cover.
No? Actually, what sealed the deal was when my friend let me "test drive" her dog. I was simply gobbsmacked at this dog leading me around things. Unlike the stick that was noisy and clattered at every step, the dog was more or less quiet. Oh that was that. To hell with college. I was getting one of those dogs.
I called Guide Dogs for the Blind on 31 July, received the information slash application packet on 2 August which I thought was a good sign as that was my sister Katie's birthday. I filled in and returned the massive amounts of forms and references required by the 15th of August. Had a home interview on 18 September...
I was sure that even after all this, I'd not be allowed to train with a dog at what sounded like the coolest school on the planet. I kept watching the post and kept not seeing anything with the GDB logo, back then a GSD in profile and shadow, on any of the letters.
On Friday, 6 October all that changed. I went to browse the post. Among the bills and letters and junk mail there was a big yellow packet with the GDB logo on it.
O my God! They wrote me back! Oh I didn't get accepted. But wait. It felt like a bunch of papers and a few tapes. Surely they wouldn't of sent such a huge package to say "no", they didn't seem like the sort of outfit to rub someone's nose in bad news. Still...
I ran into the house and tore into my packet. Tapes, and heaps of papers poored out onto the table. My mom asked what I had got and I said something from the Guide Dogs! A lot of something. My mom said she'd look at it and see what the papers said. She read out the cover letter.
I made it. They were inviting me to class in November. Wow. Me a guide dog user. Wow. Wow. woweee wow! Then something in the letter I didn't like. I had to go out to train for four weeks, which was awesome, and would be going to San Francisco. Way way beyond awesome. However the dates I was required to be away were 12 November through 9 December.
What! Were these people smoking pot! That was like over Thanks Giving! They can't do that. Everything is shut then. People have to be with their family. Really?
To say nothing of how the class also ran right on over the dates of my annaversery with my high school sweetheart and his birthday. Gah! I thought about calling them and saying I couldn't do those dates. And then I thought, there will be other Thanks Givings, and other annaverseries, as it turned out my boyfriend and I split up several months after I returned with my guide dog. I thought waiting all this time was hard. Here was a class date and everything so I best grab it when I could.
Oh wow me. class. next month. Aah! My travel packet came in on the 23rd. I remember my boyfriend reading over the packet and he made like they had written to say sorry, just kidding, you aren't getting a dog. Later that evening we were in a car accident. My first thought wasn't oh I hope my boyfriend is okay. It was. Crap! Now I'll really have to call and say I can't make it as I'll be in hospital, in traction no less. Great.
As it turned out no one was hurt, save for the other guy's car. Our car was dingged up too but the other guy, who Tboned the front driver's side by the tire, was totaled.
Finally the day before class came. I didn't sleep. At all. I worried about all sorts of nonsense. What if they lost my bags? What if I got on the wrong aircraft? What if I got lost and missed my connecting flight? What if the aircraft crashed? What if my classmates were hostile or didn't get on with me? What if my roommate was a gang member? It was California after all.
Finally it was time to go. I said good bye to my mom and my boyfriend drove me to the airport.
We made it through all the airport booyeah, a cakewalk compaired to now a days. Ugh I am not looking forward to any of this security blh blah..
We got to the gate and it hit me all at once. I started to cry. I wanted my mommy. I didn't want to go on this scary ass flight. Or to big as hell San Francisco. I didn't want to go to a 24/7 neverending, for the next 28 days, travel lesson.
My bags had been checked and I was expected to turn up at the other end of two timezones and several states later on down the day.
I got on the aircraft and sniffeled and sobbed to myself whilst listening to Nirvana and looking out the window. Then? Were were off...
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