IRRC No. 922

Dreams of a Deafblind Person!

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Photo of Alex Garcia, the “Gaucho”, one of the most famous Persons with Rare Disease and Deafblind Persons in the world.

A photo of Alex Garcia, the “Gaucho”, one of the most famous Persons with Rare Disease and Deafblind Persons in the world.

Alex Garcia, the “Gaucho”, is one of the most famous Persons with Rare Disease and Deafblind Persons in the world. He is an expert in special education at the Federal University of Santa Maria in the state of Rio Grande do Sul (UFSM/RS). He was the first Deafblind Person and Person with Hydrocephalus and Rare Disease to finish a post-graduate degree at a Brazilian university. He is the founder of the Gaucha Association of Parents and Friends of Deafblind people and people with Multiple Disabilities (AGAPASM).1 In Brazil, he has conducted pioneering research to find Deafblind people throughout the state of Rio Grande do Sul, where he is considered “the father” of Deafblindness. Since 2004, as a volunteer, he has structured a programme of home care with families of Deafblind people in Brazil. The programme helps with information and educational orientation, with medical and social referrals, with the training of professionals to attend Deafblind people in their original places, adapting these spaces, and also with special programmes in schools. As a writer, he was the first Deafblind Person to write a book about education in Latin America. His book “Deafblindness: Empirical and Scientific” was published in 2008. He was the first Deafblind Person in Brazil and Latin America to participate in a training programme for teachers with total liberty, held in Cuiabá, in the state of Mato Grosso. He was also the first Deafblind Person in Brazil and Latin America to work in a training programme for teachers with total liberty, where he taught two people with disabilities (a young blind educator and a young deaf educator). Alex also writes for the magazine Reação. Alex Garcia was the only Deafblind Person in the world to participate in the High-Level Meeting on Disability and Development “The Way Forward: A Disability-Inclusive Development Agenda Towards 2015 and Beyond” held in 2013 at the United Nations headquarters in New York. Also in 2013 he was the proponent of a public hearing to promote social inclusion of people with Deafblindness – the first hearing to deal with the issue in the history of Brazil. Alex Garcia was one of the winners, in the category “Personalities”, of the Brasil Mais Inclusão Award 2016. Email: agapasm@agapasm.com.br.

 

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I dream that one day... I will be “less” invisible for Humankind.

I dream that one day... Humankind will recover the patience it has lost.

I dream that one day... Humankind will recover its wisdom and will understand my communication.

I dream that one day... Humankind will be close again as in ancient times.

I dream that one day... Humankind will be free of prejudice and will be able to touch me without any fear.

I dream that one day... I won't be “just a brick in the wall” anymore, as Pink Floyd said in the song “Another brick in the wall”.

I dream that one day... I won't need to “drink from the same water fountain” as Carl Jung, one of the founders of modern Psychoanalysis, said.

I dream that one day... Humankind will be able to eliminate the label that deafblindness is the most terrifying condition.

I dream that one day... Humankind will assume that “being alone” doesn't mean to be abandoned.

I dream that one day... I will sow the “loneliness” that deafblindness imposes us as a possible aim to be enjoyed because we won't be afraid of ourselves.

I dream that one day... I will change the pre-assumptions concerning my identity and the sentence which is currently repeated “Poor thing, he/she is deafblind” will be left in the past.

I dream that one day... Humankind will see my being and will indeed value my essence as my fight and then will say “Great! He/she is a deafblind person”.

I dream that one day... I will erase the shame from Humankind's mind as a tool of controlling.

I dream that one day... Humankind will understand and value that all people are a Divine Creations: alike, however, incomplete.

I dream that one day... I will not just “exist” but actually “be”.

I dream that one day... I will learn to be “strong” so that nothing can defeat me.

I dream that one day... I will be “me” so nobody will forget me.

I dream that one day... My dreams will design the future.

I dream that one day... Humankind will be “human”.

Continue reading #IRRC No. 922

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