“I have always tried to live my day to day from a very young age Knowing and understanding that I didn't see well. But having to face the age of 12, in full change and with revolutionized hormones entering adolescence, which I wasn't going to listen well either already for life was the hardest blow. “Marta Martínez, Sordocyga 27 -year -old Alicante, He recounts his experience. “At school they realized that I was doing very rare movements with my eyes, that I was very close to things.”
Thanks to the ONCE began to APREENDER BRAILLE and to live with a visual disability. With 10 years the auditory loss began. “At first my parents believed that it was not a problem, but that I ignored them,” but they did evidence that they also confirmed their auditory disability. This has not prevented the young woman from having a long trajectory at the educational level. He studied at the NGO Educational Resources Center in Madrid for three years, and is technician of Pharmacy and parapharmacy; and graduated in social work.
The case of Trinidad González, 85, It is different because it began to lose these faculties at elderly. “Everything has worsened after retirement, the same loss of ear loss.” Now listen if he spoke very close to the ear, as his mediator, Iris Gonzaga, thanks to his otter convinced him to put a cochlear implant, “and it has been successful.” But the vision has no solution because it suffers hereditary glaucoma.
“I have it a little solved when I have to talk to someone if there is no ambient noise. I carry a cochlear implant thanks to my Otorrino”
“My mother also suffered. I have to go looking for solutions and now I need more to someone who accompanies me down the street and to buy, I cannot enter any trade, “he explains. At home he may be alone, although his children take a hand, knowing where his things are.
White and red cane
Trinidad walks down the street with a white and red cane, A symbol that defines deafblind people, and Marta also has her mediator, Carmen Vives, who accompanies her and helps. The biggest step that the young woman gave, he says, was to put a headphones. “Today is one of the most important aids I have, although I also have the support of mediators in class and those resources that allow me to have an independent life.”
“I have always had adapted resources according to the need. Apart from using the Braille line to read documents, I also use the screen reader”
At the tools level, the help received in all its educational career, especially in the university. “I have always had adapted resources according to the need. Apart from using The Braille line To read documents, I also use the screen reader and then. At the most concrete audition level, the University has lent me an FM license to follow the classes. “
In his particular life, he left the family home six years ago and uses tools such as a cooking plate or a pot with different colors and beeps.
Daily challenges
Thus they refer to some of the daily challenges they face due to their condition. People with deafblind living in the province of Alicante demand their place in society as more citizens and remember their special needs to achieve inclusion and full autonomy. Many of the difficulties they face come from ignorance in society towards this group and its invisibility, and quote above all Communication barrierssimply to be understood by the doctor or when they go to administrative efforts; or those of accessibilityfor example to get on the bus.
It is a unique disability that increases the risk of isolation of people affected by hindering communication
Deafblind is a Unique disability which arises as a consequence of the combination in the same person of a visual and auditory disability, which increases its risk of isolation. His international day is every June 27 and With this reason the eleven will dedicate their coupon The day before, of which five million will be broadcast, with the motto “La Aordoceguera, an inseparable part of the social group eleven.”
Census
This situation affects 15 out of 100,000 inhabitants, Therefore, in Spain, in the absence of a definitive census, it includes around 9,000 people. In the province, 150 affected is served.
Las communication barriers, of access to information and mobility can be constant and limiting, affecting such essential areas as Education, employment, social participation or personal autonomy. This does not prevent them from developing strategies that allow them inclusion, with their own effort, that of their families and specialized professionals for the care of people with deafblind.
Its reality is very variable and the very changing needs depending on the levels, always minimal, audition and visionwhich makes different communication systems forced, especially: Dactylological system, sign language, sound expansion system or the new communication model called Dactyls, a mixture of the first two.
Many deafblind people use a red cane indicative of their disability
Double support
The National Blind Organization offers coverage to these people with two specific lines of action, with presence in all communities: the technical unit of deafblind, with technology and professionals who support their inclusion; and The ONCE Foundation for the attention to people with deafblindwhich has more than 140 mediators that provide 90,000 hours of mediation and service every year.
In addition, he works with an extensive innovation program, such as the implementation of a new language for communication, known as a system Dactylswhich allows greater ease of understanding and access to information and is already extending throughout the territory.
Solidarity t -shirts and coupons
Likewise, a solidarity shirt has been designed, in black and white colors, together with El Corte Inglés, which will be sold in its Sfera stores, also online, and whose amount will be to increase mediation hours with people with deafblind, among other activities.
In the act held at the headquarters of the ONCE in Alicante in which the different initiatives have been presented, the Consell delegate in Alicante has participated, Agustina was; the director of the organization in Alicante and the vice president of her territorial council in the community, Estela Medina y María Gesse respectively; The two women with deafblindness and their mediators
The Consell delegate in Alicante, Agustina washas pledged to work in a determined way to continue working for the rights of these people.
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