The Story So Far!

Hi All!

Here it is -my second post on my new blog! I feel like a kid with a new toy! I was awake last night (not totally because of excitement over the new blog) thinking about what kinds of things I can write here! I can write all kinds of things!

Maybe to start I should tell you a little bit more about myself and how SD became an integral part of my life.

Let's see. . . .

I grew up in Ohio and got married to a wonderful man who then took a voluntary transfer to Texas. I enjoy Texas most of the time but the summers are ridiculous! I mean I think 90 degrees is plenty warm - why go into the hundreds? That is just nuts! And even nuttier - there are actually people here who LIKE the hot temperatures! I wonder if there is a greater concentration of psychologists in Texas than in other states. I will have to look into that!

Anyway - here I am. I am a teacher by profession and vocation. I have taught a total of 15 years and have enjoyed pretty much every year even though I have had my fair share of crazy supervisors! I love working with elementary age students because it is fun to see them learn and grow. My last assignment - which was my DREAM job - was teaching highly gifted fifth graders. These kiddos had IQ's of 140 or above so they really kept me on my toes. It was a super job - hard but way worth it! This job really suited me and my personality and I have no intentions of leaving for a while.

THEN - I suddenly lost my voice. It started like the "beginning of the year voice" that all teachers get. They are not used to talking all day and their voice gets overworked and sounds a bit raspy. Normal. However, my voice went from raspy to whispery (I still wasn't too concerned because this also happens to teachers). Then, my voice just stopped - and I mean stopped. I couldn't talk AT ALL! Of course I pushed myself to try to continue talking enough to keep my class going. I also became very creative in ways to teach - the computer was a God send. I learned some basic sign language through books to communicate with the entire class when I couldn't whisper in someone's ear - which was the only voice I could muster up at all.

During this time I was on anti-anxiety meds from the previous year when my principal was a psycho and I began having anxiety attacks. My primary care physician was certain that once I was no longer stressed, my voice would return. No such luck! I taught for about three and a half months with basically no voice whatsoever. This worked but was very stressful. I had my husband record the spelling lists to play for the spelling test. I had other teachers record things which had to be said out loud to the class. I typed hundreds of thousands of pages of text on the computer to project on the screen for the students to read as though it was me talking. The kids didn't mind - they seemed to think it was like a new challenge. They did pretty well with the whole system. It was me who was freaking out.

I went to an ENT and was told that there was no damage to my vocal chords and little else. He sent me to a speech therapist who became my salvation. Susan, the therapist, has a lot of experience with SD patients and, after a couple sessions, she became positive that I had ABSD. We worked to relax the muscles around my larnyx which were basically frozen from months of me trying to force myself to talk. Then we went into exercises to correct my breathing - also messed up from forcing myself. Soon, I decided to take a leave of absence from my job to concentrate on therapy. I was confident that a coupld of months would make all of the difference and I would soon be back better than ever.

WRONG! The couple of months turned into the rest of the school year and then into temporary medical disability and then I had to resign my position with the district because all of the leaves had run out. From my dream job to no job in a year. Not good!

I guess I should give you a break and quit typing for a while. Tomorrow I will continue the saga . . .

Have a super day!

Trisha