By Yamila García
A few days ago, I was registering for a new service that I wanted to access when something happened that left me wondering. The person who was registering me told me that I must access the website to complete the registration process. He told me the website, and I understood while he was saying it, but as soon as he stopped and I had to enter it on my cellphone, I couldn’t remember it. So I asked him to please repeat it to me, and while he said it, I repeated it in my head. But again, as soon as he finished saying it, I couldn’t manage to write it on my cellphone. I tried one more time, and while he said it, I simultaneously completed the sentence in my head. But once again, it was as if I were looking for something in my memory that I knew was there, and that I repeated 1 second ago, but could not access that space at the moment. The person who was with me at that moment helped me to complete the process because that could have been an endless conversation.
This has happened to me many times. I know that if I give it a minute, maybe I will be able to access it. But at the moment, I end up requiring some assistance. There is somehow a “space” between the moment in which I received information verbally and the moment in which I can use that information. I cannot access it unless I withdraw from the situation and think about it alone, without any social interaction. This happens with lectures at school too, and with regular conversations, although I learned what to say and how to act to pretend I’m following the conversation, so people don’t realize it. So this makes me think about why it is assumed that oral communication is preferred or most effective for everyone. How difficult would it be to have something written with basic instructions such as web pages, phone numbers, addresses, etc.?
Likewise, at school many times those of us who have these auditory processing difficulties find it difficult to take advantage of the lectures. The classrooms are usually very large, there are many background noises and visual stimuli that, in addition to these problems, make it even more difficult for us to concentrate on what we are listening to. However, it would help us a lot to have the recordings of the classes, or the professors’ notes at least to be able to cover what we miss at the moment. That’s why I truly appreciate the professors who see beyond their own reality and provide videos, notes, and more, recognizing that not all of us learn in the same way.