So I started on this crazy adventure yesterday at 4pm. Kat was going to do a countdown, except we were both working at the time and she suddenly looked up and said, "Have you started yet?" and I checked the clock, turned round and nodded at her. It was 4.01pm (so I possibly started a little earlier than predicted as I hadn't spoken in a few minutes, but at least I didn't speak after it had started!).
We had a video interview with Bruce (the college website guy) yesterday about our expectations, I was camera-shy, but managed to endure it (luckily Bruce kept it nice and relaxed so I managed to ramble on in true Lucy-style), and Kat said lots of very relevant things. It should be up on here in the next couple of days or so (providing the computers play nice with Bruce) and then we'll see how much sense I managed to make and how pink my face went...
At first using the Say-it! Sam was a lot harder than I was expecting, although the interface is nice and it's got everything I need, it's a major adjustment to suddenly have to really think about everything you say and select it carefully. It also isn't quite as fast as I am with my typing, so in general I'll finish typing a message and then have to wait a moment for it to catch up on the display. Although one feature that I liked about this communicator that I just thought was kind of nifty, I ended up using more than I thought I would already. It can display your message as full-screen text (like the image above) instead of using the electronic voices and this is actually proving a much more efficient way of getting my message accross, due to most people's lack of familiarity with the synthetic voices (it's like understanding an unfamiliar accent if you're not used to it). Matthew (my fiancé) found it much easier to read the screen when I was talking to him at home than try to listen to the voice.
However, I have found that using the voice is the only way to communicate with somebody who is driving a car without making them crash. And it is also pretty useful to get the attention of somebody in the room. I guess I'll have to see which function I rely on more as the week passes.
Last night Maria (a work-friend) gave me a lift to my bus-stop, so she was actually the first person to have a conversation with me using the communicator. She found the voice difficult to tune in to, but changing the settings to a male voice helped a great deal. We went to a garden centre to look at plants for her and baby Christmas trees for me. I was quite interested in some tiny potted trees (I don't like the idea of cutting one down and want to plant out the tree we buy this year, if we do buy one), and normally would have marched right up to the attendants and demanded to know all kinds of stuff about droppage and growth rate and watering and the like, but decided instead to stand and text Matthew to ask him if he wanted me to pick one up or if we should both come back together at the weekend. He wanted to choose one together and to tell the truth, I was really relieved! I can already see that I'll be tempted to let him do all the talking if we're out together.
Getting my bus was no hassle as I have a weekly bus ticket, and just had to show it to the driver. Next Monday I will actually have to ask for a ticket and buy it, that should be fun on a noisy, crowded bus first thing in the morning!
I got home without anybody speaking to me (which is pretty much the norm), and waited for Matthew to get home from work. As I said, he found the voice harder to understand and a lot of the time I resorted to gesturing at him (he doesn't understand Makaton signing!), but (as Kat suggested) I have a feeling we'll have our own little language by the end of the week!
I did use my backup communication aid as well, once the communicator was on charge, Matthew asked me a couple of things and I spelt them out for him on a little A5 letter board, pointing at the letters and space, although he was tending to guess what the words were before I finished them, I am not sure yet whether this should annoy or please me!
He also had a sudden realisation that he was slowing down his speech for me. He was surprised to find himself doing this as it annoys him so much when people assume that because his brother communicates slowly (he has a speech impediment), he must understand slowly, too. He said he actually had to keep reminding himself to talk normally, as my understanding wasn't affected by my using a communicator. I have a feeling he's trying to adjust to the silences in conversation, too, as he suggested that as I was being so quiet, maybe I wanted it to be quiet!
He also found himself pointing to things rather than speaking them, as I had started doing this. I am hoping this week isn't going to drive us both round the bend!
Ironically, I have a bit of a sore throat today! I think perhaps this has come at a very convenient time, it seems my voice needs a break!
I'll sign off for now (I think that's a fair chunk of info for one morning). Stay tuned!
Lucy
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