Hi folks, I have a couple of things I?d like to add to our Tuesday discussions if we can get around to them this Tuesday or the next. Most important so I?ll discuss it first is the new Federationist I recently met in southern Oklahoma. She is outside of my work area so I can?t help her through my job but I am talking with her by phone and trying to help her stay involved. She lives too far away to reach a chapter but is staying in contact with my state affiliate president and a few other members. This person is a client of my agency as well and is trying to find a way to live independently. she has become paralyzed with limited range of motion in her upper body so that she would be able to move a cane left and right. The problem is that she has literally no sense of touch. I?m not talking about general neuropathy I?m talking about being unaware of body temperature when she becomes too hot or too cold. She has absolutely no feeling at all. This disorder comes from damage to her spinal column and brain stem. She is doing a lot of research on how to use computers with sip and puff devices and other mechanisms. She has taught me about a program that connects jaws to Dragon naturally speaking.. She knows more about her physical and technological needs than anyone in Oklahoma because she has gotten online and done the research. She just discovered NFB because she has been paralyzed for 19 years and didn?t hear about it when she was just blind. I?m not sure why but 20 years ago there?s no telling. My task is to find a way for her to detect drop off?s. I can?t get to her personally but might be able to get her to experiment with things independently if she has some ideas. The only thing I can really think about is getting one of our fiberglass canes and putting a marshmallow tip on it so that she can have constant contact. Then adding a fishing weight so that when a cane comes off of a drop, she can hear the sound and be aware of the distance her arm is moving as opposed to the way it moves on a regular surface. has anyone out there worked with somebody this disabled ? She is living with aging parents and is worried about losing them and having no support system. She is in early 40s and does not want to go to a nursing home. She is bright, articulate and has a future for employment if we can just find work where she can use her mind and appropriate technology. Once I can help her find a way to detect drop off?s, and clear path with her cane, we will worry about orientation. Naturally, I have been advocating for her to attend a training center. She went to Arkansas back in the early 90s but she was walking. Also between you and me guys it was Arkansas. I told her that because she was not using a wheelchair and was not paralyzed to this degree, this is an opportunity to tell her counselor that she needs further blindness training as a wheelchair user. She needs to advocate to be sent off to another center. I told her that Oklahoma contracts with six orientation and adjustment centers and that she needs to get a list of them from her counselor, call everyone of them and ask them the same list of questions. Naturally I want her to go to one of our training centers but which one? We have had leaders from Blind Inc. and Louisiana on these calls with us. What can you advise? I?m especially hoping that Jennifer kennedy will weigh in on this. And maybe Roland could persuade Pam to join this call. Thanks for all your help guys Sent from my iPhone