because the only true disability is never having tried at all.

WELCOMING MY neurodiversity

This is me, feeling you are can never be you. I forever will stand by myself because so long I I have felt embarrassed, frustrated, outcast, overwhelmed, and helpless throughout my younger years. I became very much aware of my challenges and what I was going through since my mother brought me to every school meeting overview of IEP testing. I have been transferred to schools to help me succeed, this included public schools, Christian schools, homeschool, and a special education school. I remember a class in high school when I studied with my father for a total of 15 hours for one test, but I completely failed the modified exam. I graduate high with a Special education diploma.

After, I started taking classes at my local college, but because of all the challenges I was still facing in education and the experience I went through eventually gave up thriving to catch up with my college students. My learning differences truly took a toll on my life even with the events of my life experiencing physical, emotional, cyber, and verbal bullying. I had fallen into a 7-year emotional roller coaster.

Later, I forced myself to start reading again in my 20’s for the first time in a long time. I planned out for myself the day, weeks, and months ahead of me. I used tools that I had picked up through the different teaching styles in my life and added my own. I started reading a kindergarden book and worked my way up. I wrote, type every word I did know how to sound out onto a page, then found the definition on the computer and type that up. I did this every time and read the book again until I understood a full

I have learned that a book is just a book, that big words are just letters all put together. I learned that I wasn’t able to finish a sentence unless interested in and I could only read short reading materials. That I am going to get overwhelmed, I am sometimes not going to understand things, I will mix up my words. As time went on I was able to read materials by myself and understand them for the first time in my life. To this day, I still use my tools when I read and in my own daily life, I write down sentences I enjoy and that inspire me.

If I do not understand a word, I write the word and the definition in a notebook and many other tricks and tools to help me in my life today. I still wish to go back and get my degree but in the meantime, I have not stopped getting an education.

I am a woman with many stories and I vowed to continue to open the voice box of others with these struggles. The only disability, it had not been tried at all.