To reach
My diploma in Biochemistry.
Either scroll down or click HERE.
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Acronym definitions
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PTSD - Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
- TBI --- Traumatic Brain Injury.
- ADA -- Americans with Disabilities Act.
- DSS ---- Disabled Student Services at UC Santa Cruz.
I was their client starting Fall 1984 to Spring 1990.
- DSPandS - Disabled Students
Program and Services at Cabrillo College. I was their client
starting Fall 1991 to Spring 2007.
- DRC --- Disabled Resource Center at UC Santa Cruz.
I was their client starting Fall 2007 to Spring 2008.
- DSS was renamed DRC after my sham graduation from UC Santa Cruz in 1989. Their website says in the
1990's, but no more accurate information is available. I found the exact same facade of service under a new name. Changing the name had
affected the hostility I found with DSS. It was more apparent with DRC.
- DSPandS was renamed Accessibility Support
Center (ASC) when I checked in November 2014. Is this the same facade of service under a new name?
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Ray - my friend and buddy
for 34 years.
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I am a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) survivor with a degree in Biochemistry, I earned after my accident. The experts kept telling me, healing
from my
TBI was no longer possible. Happily, I ignored them (their dire/sadistic attempts to make me feel hopeless) and listened to other head injury survivors.
Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy did allow me recovery from my TBI 31 years after the climbing accident my family and friends thought had killed me,
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Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT) - Recovery for Head Injury (TBI) Survivors.
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In 1983, a 165 foot rock climbing fall left me in coma for six weeks, with a
broken back, a TBI and other serious injuries. 31 years after
my accident I had finally given up on exercising to improve my physical condition. The right side
of my body didn't respond to motor input anymore. Exercise made me tired, but had no effect on my right side - it was really discouraging. Then in August 2014
I heard about HBOT on Brain Injury Radio. Intrigued, I contacted
Bay Area
Hyperbarics
though I had no expectations of ever having a
functioning right side of my body again.
I was (and am) utterly astounded by this completely unexpected positive increase in my physical well being.
After 60 HBOT sessions:
- I am using my diaphragm to form words again. The volume and depth of my voice is increasing. It is
becoming easier for me to make myself heard in noisy locations. My normal speaking voice is returning after being gone for 31 years.
- After session 3, I realized my right foot was not longer dragging on
the ground. It was ruining my shoes and
The picture above is a link to Bay Area Hyperbarics,
in the southern San Francisco Bay Area.
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did not respond to exercise, I did not know what else I could do.
- I was so used to chewing with the left side of my mouth, that I was unaware I was doing that.
After 31 years I chew with both sides of my mouth again.
- I can stand with weight on my right leg again. It would not support me before
HBOT
and I fell a few times a year for 31 years.
- After 31 years I have stopped favoring my right leg. My weight is equally spread between
my feet once more.
- After 31 years I no longer lean to the right.
- After 31 years fine motor control is returning to the right side of my body.
- I can shave faster with less pressure.
- Before session 16 I was able to stand free without having to constantly brace myself.
- After 31 years I can read print with both eyes open again.
- After 31 years I can hand write letters again.
- I can pet my cat with my right hand now, without her trying to bite me.
- After 31 years I can eat using my right hand again.
- For the first time ever I can write my own mathematical equations (calculus) and have the time to error check them
for Algebraic mistakes.
- I can tutor mathematics, chemistry and physics because now I have the ability to show in writing what I am talking about.
Before Hyperbarics I was physically unable to do that.
TBI survivors need to know that they have an alternative to being alone, feeling depressed and miserable about themselves.
I will always be grateful to Bay Area
Hyperbarics for helping me mitigate the more serious effects of my TBI.
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I was the best student (click on the picture to the right to read my evaluation) in Organic
Chemistry at UC Santa Cruz in July 1982.
A month later, my brother and I, ran from Tuolumne Meadows to Yosemite Valley (click on the picture of
the trail sign to the left to read my account of our jaunt), 29.9 miles in 11 hours.
Close the window that opens to return to this page.
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Scroll down to
TBI page navigation
or click HERE.
Remember to scroll
up to return here.
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My diploma in Biochemistry.
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Wireless Technology (WiFi) has serious concerns which
are being deliberately withheld from the consumer.
Ex: Lack of Media coverage of brain cancer causes.
Independent scientists are in rare agreement on
this issue. Read what they are saying about
wireless communications by clicking Here.
Scientific studies and opinions concerning
wireless communications (54), click
Links
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Better late then never.
31 years after my accident I found
completely unexpected recovery.
Click on HYPERBARICS
to see my amazing experience.
DSS, DSPandS, DRC and other acronyms used are defined
HERE
Remember to scroll
down to return here.
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14 months after my accident, I returned to UC Santa Cruz (UCSC),in Fall 1984 to complete
my final year of studies. However, I did not graduate until March 21, 1989. If I had not been a TBI survivor, I would
have graduated five years earlier, but I was physically unable to carry a full class load. I would have graduated with the knowledge,
for my major, that took me an additional 18 years of dropped, repeated and failed classes (part-time study) to acquire and demonstrate.
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The head of DSS introduced me to the concepts of “Social Isolation”and “Learned Helplessness”. This
staff person chose to give me help writing (note-takers) for lecture only. She claimed she was not required to help me with my homework, and, therefore, would
not She was an expert and it never occured to me that she would lie to me. Anyway I have included the best example of my writing from Spring 2008, 24 years later,
I do not have any samples form the early years because my writing was so terrible I threw all my writing away. I did not know what to
think. Everytime I objected to DSS and their treatmentof me, she attacked me. I guess she was taking my needs as a personel attack or
maybe she thought I was lying, that I was too lazy to write my homework? The thinly veiled hostility, I had noticed, blossomed into undisguised arrogance towards me in
the short time I had known this staff person.
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She bragged to me about how, she had been hired, because she promised to save money. This Staff person planned to save money by denying needed help to the
clients of DSS (ask her confidente - the Staff person I worked with). She also planned to fire Staff that did not agree with her policies and replace
them with people that did not protest her new policies. The head of DSS knew how much trouble I had had with finding a capable lab assistant, and yet
bragged to me in late Spring 1986 about her plans for a “separate-but-equal” lab facility. A place where disabled students could be further
isolated from their peers. A place of educational apartheid, I thought. She did not respond when I asked her where they were going to find the people to run
this facility, or where it was going to be built?
Anyway, two brief descriptions of the psychological torture DSS, DSPandS and DRC used on me from Fall 1984
through Spring 2008 follow:
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- “Social Isolation”
refers to a complete or near-complete lack of contact with society for members
of social species. It is usually involuntary, making it distinct from isolating tendencies or
actions consciously undertaken by a person, all of which go by various other names. It is
also not the same as loneliness rooted in temporary lack of contact with other humans. Social
isolation can be an issue for anyone despite their age, each age group may show more symptoms
than the other as children are different from adults.
“Social Isolation” takes fairly common forms across the spectrum regardless
of whether that isolation is self-imposed or is a result of a historical lifelong isolation
cycle that has simply never been broken, which also does exist. All types of social isolation can lead
to staying home for days or weeks at a time; having no communication with anyone including family
or even the most peripheral of acquaintances friends; and willfully avoiding any contact with other
humans when those opportunities do arise. Even when socially isolated people do go out into public
and attempt social interactions, the social interactions that succeed — if any — are brief and at least
somewhat superficial.
For a thorough exploration of this topic, click on
“Social Isolation”.
- “Learned
Helplessness” is the condition of a human or animal that has learned to
behave helplessly, failing to respond even though there are opportunities for it to help itself by
avoiding unpleasant circumstances or by gaining positive rewards. Learned Helplessness theory is
the view that clinical depression and related mental illnesses may result from a perceived absence
of control over the outcome of a situation. Organisms that have been ineffective and less sensitive
in determining the consequences of their behavior are defined as having acquired “Learned
Helplessness”.
There are several aspects of human helplessness that have no counterpart among animals. One of the
most intriguing aspects is "vicarious learning (or modelling)": that people can learn to be
helpless through observing another person encountering uncontrollable events. Apart from the shared
depression symptoms between human and other animals such as passivity, introjected hostility, weight
loss, appetite loss, social and sexual deficits, some of the diagnostic symptoms of learned
helplessness—including depressed mood, feelings of worthlessness, and suicidal ideation—can be found
and observed in human beings but not necessarily in other animals. In non-human animal models, control
over stress conveys resilience to future uncontrolled stressors and induces changes in the function
of specific neurons within the prefrontal cortex.
For a thorough exploration of this topic, click on
“Learned Helplessness”.
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Some of the effects of, “Learned Helplessness”
- In fall 2004, 15 years after I graduated from UC Santa Cruz, I solved a Calculus problem
(at Cabrillo College) using trigonometric
substitution when the instructor didn’t think it could be done using any method other then
partial fractions. I was able to do that because a friend did all the writing (on a whiteboard) while
I did all the thinking and told him what to write. I know, for a fact, if I had had to workout that
problem on my own, I could not achieved the result I did, because writing is so difficult for me.
Calculus skills are essential for the Chemistry 163 series at UC Santa Cruz.
- In fall 2007 I scored 79 on the Chemistry 163A
midterm (quantum theory, UC Santa Cruz), while the class average was 59. I would have scored
an 87, but did not have assistance in preparing my equation sheet (DRC never offered
to help me with my writing, though they knew I needed help, I had told them) and so, chose not
write down the formula for the angular momentum of a particle, because the act of writing was
so difficult for me. As a result, I lost eight points on the first problem, because I needed
that formula, but did not have it. If DRC was truly interested in helping me with my
education, they would have supplied me with writing assistance. However, like DSS before
them, they did not do their job and attacked me for telling my notetaker to do a better job
(Spring 2008).
- The team of, Martin Seligman and Steve Maier (University of Pennesylvania, 1967), noted
the effects of “Learned Helplessness” on the people
who observed what was being done to 'others' who needed help, but were denied. They saw an increased
lack of empathy, of "blaming the victim," for needing help. In otherwords, the effects of
“Learned Helplessness” extend beyond the disabled student (who is directly affected),
to his/her peers. From their observations (and others), our education system has been
subverted to teach intolerance and harshness by the use of, “Learned Helplessness”.
The policy of “Social Isolation” ensures that the victim (TBI survivor)
is unlikely to
ever talk about their educational experiences, because they think, wrongly, that
nobody cares. A more
correct realization
is that, "Nobody knows," of what is being done to their, brothers and sisters who have
survived a TBI.
- Lynne MacDonald (Demand Media) observed the effects of stress and depression among employees who
were subjected to, “Learned Helplessness”. Furthermore, she also recognized,
"passivity," as a outcome, noting that, "Their experience teaches them to react passively
to similar situations as a means of coping," which explains bevavior of mine which I thought
was bizarre (not advocating for myself).
Martin Seligman (University of Pennsylvania, 1967) noticed that dogs that had learned to behave
helplessly did not attempt to escape unpleasent stimuli (mild electric shock). Likewise, I knew I
needed writing help, but would not advocate for myself. Here were two examples of the benefits
(and consequences of denial of
accommodation), but I remained quiet - DSS had conditioned me to accept the
destruction of my social life (whenever I was in school), not to speak about my social needs
as a human being not being met.
No one has ever made the connection before, between, “Social Isolation”
and “Learned Helplessness”. It is reckless, to knowingly engage in such behavior
with no feedback mechanism. Maybe DSS,
DSPandS and DRC were ashamed of what they were doing to
their clients and did not want other people to see what they were up to? Whatever the reason,
the lack of feedback meant that there was no way to improve services for their clients with
TBI. What the use of these programs has done to my life because of no
feedback (or oversight) is sobering.
It seems the purpose of DSS, DSPandS
and DRC was not my education They had zero intention of helping me with my education. They did
present the Facade (note-takers), but they really had no intention of helping me and every intention
of denying me accommodation whenever possible.
From my experience, I conclude, the purpose of DSS, DSPandS
and DRC was to make the observer think that TBI survivors were being served, when in fact;
they were not.
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Most importantly, I would have avoided the “Social Isolation” and
“Learned Helplessness” which DSS used to make me docile and
manipulate me.
DSS' actions of 29 years ago, started the process that
continues to mess up my life, today (September 2013).
I had noticed a thinly veiled hostility directed at me from
the head of DSS in early Fall 1984, but thought I was imagining things. DSS was
here to help me, after all. I had no idea that DSS was trying to save money by
denying needy students accommodation for their disability. Or that they had no training in
dealing with TBI and its specific needs. My concern was to
continue with my education after I survived a TBI that, everyone thought, had killed me.
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Q: What is the simplest way to observe the optical Doppler effect?
A: Go out at and look at cars. The lights of the ones approaching you
are white, while the lights of the ones moving away from you are red.
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Section 1 (of 7)
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My diploma in Biochemistry.
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[Page 2]
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More of the Same
In 1990 the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA)
was signed
into law, but nothing was different for me
in Higher Education. Having been attacked and bullied at UCSC years before whenever
I protested
my treatment by DSS, I had been conditioned to keep my mouth shut and not to question
how I was being treated.
After years of Social Isolation and denial of accommodation (Learned
Helplessness), I became used to being alone and
I always felt bad about myself.
Sometimes I felt very self-destructive, even suicidal - this was the school experience I
became accustomed to.
When I experienced the same treatment and had the same self-destructive feelings
at Cabrillo College - I
was not surprised. At that point I assumed the ADA did not apply to me. It never
occured to me that one of the Staff People of
DSPandS was deliberately breaking
the law by knowingly denying me accommodation for my disability.
Starting Fall 1991, I attended Cabrillo College, as a client of
DSPandS,
on and off, for 16 years. I returned to UCSC as a client of DRC
in Fall 2007
and Winter/Spring 2008.
My need for help writing has been acknowledged by
both campuses, but has never extended beyond
lecture at either school.
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Some consequences of “Social
Isolation” and “Learned Helplessness”
The effects of the
isolation from my fellow students and the costant humiliation of these two policies were
really horrible. I had no idea what I had done to deserve this treatment.
I have 24 years of experience dealing with
professional people who
want to help me.
I think their behavior is due
to them not knowing what to do with a TBI Survivor. As
I did not fit into their twisted version of reality, these Staff people were determined
to withhold service from me, to make me 'fit' into their twisted view of reality.
If the schools were doing their job, in my case, this waste of my time, my life and my money
could have been prevented.
From my experience the humiliation, we are subjected to everyday, is mind numbing. The
social isolation and loneliness of being a TBI survivor is really horrible. What
sadistic person dreamed this existence up? "Social Isolation" and "Learned
Helplessness" are very effective methods of Psychological Torture. Look at
what these programs have done to my life.
Why else would I participate in the humiliation and shame for 24 years? (masochism does
not appeal to me).
Where is the surprise TBI
Survivor's often commit
suicide? 100% of the time the suicide is blamed on the TBI, without any
evidence to back that idea up? If these people make these assertions, they need to supply
the data that supports what they are saying.
People, that have never been discriminated against, are trying to justify
why TBI Surviors are to blame, for the discrimination we face every day. Who
are these people to tell other people what it's like to be disabled when they are not?
I would have gone crazy if not for my
friends.
There is no responsibility assigned to the reality of no support
the TBI Survivor faces. I am unaware of any attempt to find out what the TBI
Survivor needs or thinks. I lived in a cooperative, "The Daily Planet," for a couple
of years, starting in 1990. I lived with seven other people. I grew used to having other
people around, to having people nearby to ask for help. They respected me for who
I was. Loneliness had been a real drag for me. I was going crazy from it
and suddenly it was gone. I started to get creative once again and wrote
The Pass then.
Moving from
the, "Daily
Planet," is the worst decision I have ever made.
Other TBI Survivors are not as fortunate as I was.
Eventually, the lack of support, the loneliness and the ridicule they face is so horrible,
they take their own life. I have lived, and am living it. While I would never do something
like that, I can understand the depression and despair that would lead someone else
to commit suicide. I can not understand why we are so indifferent to the needs of
our disabled brothers and sisters they would feel they have no other option?
Treating disabled students as people.
School is the proper environment to teach people to empathize and care
for each other. Instead students are taught to ridicule, humiliate and avoid students that
have survived accidents that used to kill everyone that had the misfortune to encounter one.
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"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
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Section 2 (of 7)
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My diploma in Biochemistry.
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A smiling Staff Member of DSPandS
(in their office at Cabrillo College)
bragged to me in October 2009, she had
deliberately chosen to withhold writing assistance from me for many years, though
she knew I needed it. My mouth, literally, fell open. Did this Staff person know what
they were saying? Was she aware of the, “Social Isolation” to which
her actions condemned me? I made few friends because I was always doing my homework. I
had no social life.
I could not comphrehend her pride in what she had done.
Was she proud of breaking the law, in front of everyone, for
so many years and getting away with it?
Her contempt for me is shown by the fact
she told me. She had been deliberately denying me accommodation for 16 years. Enough
time (more than 90 days since I was last enrolled at Cabrillo College) had elapsed
so she assumed, legally she was safe from prosecution. She was safe from a criminal
lawsuit, but she wasn't thinking about a civil lawsuit.
The fact that I was competent to
look into the possibility of a civil lawsuit against her, her immediate
superior(s) and her employer, did not occur to her. Which serves to illustrate the
attitude of the people that were helping me with my education.
I survived a traumatic accident, that everyone thought had killed me.
How was, being a TBI survivor, used by DSS, DSPandS and DRC as justification
in choosing not to accommodate my disability? Does that explain why they felt it necessary to wreck my life?
Seligman & Maier observed in 1967, puzzling behavior in dogs. These dogs made no attempt to
escape adverse stimuli (electric shock). This behavior was termed,
“Learned Helplessness.” The dogs had been subjected to events beyond
their control and learned to behave helplessly.
DSS, DSPandS and DRC saying they were not aware of what they were doing to me is not credible.
It had been known for 17 years before I was a client of DSS about the effects of, “Learned Helplessness” on mammals.
In a email from UCSC was
a pdf document, dated November 2, 2010 (I requested the hard copy, 5/23/12, 5/24/12, finally mailing a written request 6/29/12 and received the pdf
document 7/11/12). The "Assistant Chancellor/Chief of Staff" of UCSC, implied I was responsible for UCSC's discrimination, that my
expectations were the source of my problems, their lack of service was not a factor. DSS and DRC, breaking the law and using my
disability to harm me, was not mentioned.
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"Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and he'll sit in a boat and drink beer
all day."
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Section 3 (of 7)
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My diploma in Biochemistry.
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[Page 2]
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When I returned to UCSC after my accident I was writing at 1/6 of my previous speed.
The head of DSS introduced me to the concepts of
“Social Isolation”and “Learned Helplessness”.
This Staff person chose to
give me help writing (note-takers) for lecture only. She claimed she
were not required to help me with my homework, and,
therefore, would not (I have included the best example of my writing from Spring
2008, 24 years later). The thinly veiled hostility, I had noticed, blossomed into
undisguised arrogance towards me
in the short time I had worked with this Staff person.
The head of DSS bragged to me about how, she had been hired, because
she promised to
save money. This Staff person planned to
save money by denying needed help to the clients of DSS (ask her confidente -
the Staff person I worked with). She also planned to fire Staff that did not
agree with her policies and
replace them with people that did not protest the new policies. The head of
DSS knew how
much trouble I had
had with finding a capable lab assistant, and yet bragged to me in late Spring 1986
about her plans
for a “separate-but-equal” lab facility. A place where disabled students
could be further isolated from their peers. A place of educational
apartheid, I thought.
The head of
DSS did not respond when I asked
where they were going to find the people to run this facility, or where it was going
to be built?
After repeated
refusals and attacks by this Staff person, I came to expect angry denials, if I were
foolish enough to
keep requesting accommodation for my disability. DSS was not educating students
and she did not like to be reminded of that fact.
I did not realize the head of DSS had been hired to save money.
She had not been hired to help clients with their education.
The head of DSS got upset at me for reminding her of the hypocrisy
of her position.
This Staff person was not accountable
to anyone for what DSS did to their clients. She told me that she was
in charge of my education and I had to do
whatever she decided. This Staff person made it very clear (it was stated to me),
she was not interested in any feedback from me.
I really disliked the head of DSS and found out my animosity was shared
by every student
that had to work with DSS. This Staff person called a meeting on December
1st 1986 at
Stevenson College (UCSC) for all clients of DSS. She was
late. As soon as she appeared, she started in by telling us, she had decided
(in conference with the Staff person I worked with)
note taking was a waste of money and therefore would be canceled.
Every client DSS worked with (about 35 of us) lit into her.
The “Social Isolation”and “Learned Helplessness”
had not beaten us down.
The head of DSS was not expecting us to stand up for our rights - it was too funny.
She got really flustered and would not look at us. She did not just feign
suprise, she was surprised,
at how angry we were with her.
I finally realized it was not just me that was getting attacked. She was bullying every
disabled student. Everyone of us hated her.
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There's a story about the military pilot asking for a priority landing
because his single-engine jet fighter was running “a little
rough.”
Air Traffic Control told him he was number two behind a B-52
that had one engine shut down.
There is silence for a moment and the fighter pilot says, “Not the
dreaded seven engine landing?”.
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Section 4 (of 7)
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My diploma in Biochemistry.
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[Page 2]
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Jan, the one Staffer at DSS I liked, who I had rapport with, was fired.
At the time I
wondered why? I asked the head of DSS, who came up with some
cock-and-bull story about how Jan was
not doing her job, etc.. I did not believe her, but let it go. DSS
was now under the exclusive control of the Staff People who despised me for my disability.
The remaining Staff People of DSS thought they had crushed me, that I was
beaten down by them, that I
would never tell
about their sadistic and shameful actions. Who would listen to, or
believe a recipient of their abuse, after this long a time?
Epecially when these revelations of abuse are coming from a student who can not even
speak clearly?
Why is he credible?
Five reasons spring immediately to mind:
- I have a degree in Biochemistry.
- I have the background (my senior research) to analyze what was done to me..
- I took the time (18 years) to actually be proficient in the various aspects/material
that my degree encompassed.
- I am well aware of the paranoia from my PTSD and am making real effort to not
let my analysis turn into an angry rant about the Staff who subjected me
to “Social Isolation”and “Learned
Helplessness”.
- I was researching, "Psychological Torture," and I came across,
“
Learned Helplessness”. Intrigued, I read more about it and some
really puzzeling behavior, suddenly made sense. They have known about,
“Learned Helplessness” and its effects since 1967 (17 - 18,
years). Was what
was done to me
was deliberate? Did DSS know what they were doing? DRC was
doing the same destructive Behavior Modification in Fall 2007 and
Winter/Spring 2008.
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There is this farmer who is having problems with his chickens. All of a
sudden, they are all getting very sick and he doesn't know what is wrong
with them. His veterinarian can't figure it out. In desperation, the farmer
calls a biologist, a chemist,
and a physicist to see if they can figure out what is wrong. So the biologist
looks at the chickens, examines them a bit, and says he has no clue what could
be wrong with them. Then the chemist takes some tests and makes some
measurements, but he can't come to any conclusions either. So the physicist
tries. He stands there and looks at the chickens for a long time without
touching them or anything.
Then all of the sudden he starts scribbling away
in a notebook. Finally, after several intricate and involved calculations,
he excitedly exclaims,
"I've got it!" and then sheepishly admits, "My solution will only work for
spherical chickens in a vacuum."
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Section 5 (of 7)
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My diploma in Biochemistry.
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[Page 2]
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The Effects of 24 years of DSS',
DSPandS' and
DRC's ignoring my disability:
I became used to spending enormous amounts of time alone, working on my homework.
It was always hard to
read, poorly composed and unfinished.
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My best effort to write the left half of the
upper formula in Spring 2008. Try to imagine
how bad my writing was 24 years before this.
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This had the following scholastic effects:
- In the 24 years I was a client of DSS,
DSPandS and DRC, I did not
turn in one completed homework assignment in any of my classes.
- I never studied for midterms or finals. I was
still trying to finish my homework.
- I never used the equation sheets that I wrote for my midterms or finals -
they were indecipherable. I still made them, had them with me sometimes,
but could not figure out what my scribbles meant.
- I did not have time to study with my fellow students,
join any clubs or associations.
- I dropped classes, I repeated classes and I even failed some.
- Every time (without exception) that I raised objection to the way I was
treated,
I was attacked by DSS and DRC. This started in Fall 1984,
Winter/Spring 1985 and Spring 2008.
- The “Social Isolation”and “Learned
Helplessness” that DSS started,
DSPandS and DRC continued.
I could not do well in class without writing help, so my academic record was
completely ruined as a result.
- My dreams of graduate school were destroyed by these people. I scored a "93" ("99" possible)
on the GRE subject exam (Biology) in October 1987.I even applied to
and went on an interview for graduate school in Pharmaceutical Chemistry
at UCSF in Spring 1990, but could not get excited about continuing with
school. Because of DSS and their denial of accommodation for my
disability, I knew my degree was a
sham. I had few friends and my social life was wrecked. My heart was
not into more
of this education (graduate school).
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“Physics isn't the most important thing. Love is.” - Richard P. Feynman (Nobel prize
winning Physicist)
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Section 6 (of 7)
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My diploma in Biochemistry.
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[Page 2]
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Top [Page 2]
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The lack of training for DSS,
DSPandS and DRC to rehabilitate
TBI Survivors, made it seem they wanted to isolate and punish me for being disabled.
Their actions not only shredded my academic record,
they also started, and continued, the destruction of my private life.
- I had hours and hours to dwell on how ashamed I was of my writing. I was doing
my best and my homework always looked terrible -
It was really depressing.
- While in school, I had no time to maintain existing friendships. Most of them
faded away.
- I couldn't focus on movies, dinners, lunches or anything - I was always
preoccupied with homework I had not finished or homework that I could not do.
- DSS, DSPandS and DRC constantly treated me like a freak. I felt
like there was something wrong with me for being alive,
wanting to continue with my education after surviving a horrendous accident and needing
help. Being denied accommodation,
by the people being paid to
help me with my education, reinforced that I deserved what they chose to do to me.
My “Social Isolation”and “Learned Helplessness”
was initiated by DSS, then strongly reinforced by
DSPandS and DRC.
- While aware of some women's interest in me, I couldn't believe it, I felt really
hopeless and despicable. Weren't
they aware that I was physically
unable to
finish my homework, though I kept trying and trying? I could pay my rent, eat and not
much else. How could I
support them and a family? I felt really terrible about myself.
- I was, and still am, harassed by some Gay men. I am amazed and amused at DSS for
starting this and
DSPandS and DRC for continuing it.
These Staff People were so sadistic and
humorless, I
have to laugh at them. The repercussions of their actions (sexual harssment), however, are not funny
and I find no humor in what they have done to my life.
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The experimentalist comes running excitedly into the theorist's office,
waving a graph taken off his latest experiment.
"Hmmm," says the theorist, "That's exactly where
you'd expect to see that peak. Here's the reason (long logical explanation
follows)." In the middle
of it, the experimentalist says "Wait a minute",
studies the chart for a second, and says, "Oops, this is upside down." He fixes it.
"Hmmm," says the theorist, "You'd expect to see a dip in exactly that
position. Here's the reason...".
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Section 7 (of 7)
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My diploma in Biochemistry.
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[Page 2]
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Top [Page 2]
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I am aware of, and remember specific incidents that illustrate,
what the Staff People of DSS did (“Social Isolation”and
“Learned Helplessness”), and were trying to do, to me. For example:
- The head of DSS is the most sadistic and unpleasent person I have ever
known. I happened upon a book she and the woman she brought in, to replace
Jan Phillips, published. The title was, "Faculty Guidelines for Teaching Students
with Disabilities".
I wrote a review which was not favorable back in 2005 (I think). Click
Here to see the book and my review.
Once, after this Staff person had again denied me
accommodation for my disability, she asked me if I had ever thought about
killing myself? This Staff person seemed disappointed when I responded truthfully
with, "No. Why would I want to do that?" I guess my answer was unbelievable,
as she asked me again.
She got the same reply. I think, her policies of “Social Isolation”
and “Learned Helplessness”
were not having the desired effect. Eventually, working with DSS made me
crazy enough to intimate self destruction, but not in Fall 1984.
- The Staff Person I had to work with at DSS, was not satisfied
with destroying my social life,
ruining most of my friendships and making me feel suicidal. She was
even trying to
change my sexual orientation - click on
my evidence for my example.
I was her 'victim', her plaything and she could do anything she liked as no one would
ever find out.
This
series of events is so unbelievable, it seems ludicrous, like a dark comedy
written by some crazy people.
I lived it and, realizing what she was trying to do, I am amazed at how much I still despise that Staff Person.
She was working for DRC (up at UC Santa Cruz) in 2008 where
I saw her when I could not avoid it. How this Staff person could be so oblivious to
how people she had worked with,
to the ammount of
loathing and anger I still have towards her 18 years later, illustrates that
they viewed me as someone to
manipulated, a person who was incapable of feelings of anger and rage.
I was a freak who deserved to be treated like a second class citizen, because
I-didn't-matter and no one would ever find out.
This Staff person stands
as an example of why Staff people need to be trained for positions where they will be
working with TBI Survivors.
- Rehabilitation of TBI survivors is very importent. Recruitment of capabable lab
and writing assistants is a priority that should not be left to Staff people who have shown
that they will not take TBI survivors educational aspirations, seriously.
I think the Staff of DSS, DSPandS and
DRC, who
did this to me, were expecting me to
drop out of school. They made little effort to help me with my education,
rather, I have the definate impression, they expected me to go away. I was
determined to improve my life and
would not go away. Why were they trying to make me go away? I can not figure that out.
They seemed to want me to give up on improving my life. That is what their
actions seemed meant to do.
The fact they left me with feelings of hopelessness,
despair and paranoia (PTSD) was
my problem - not theirs.
The ADA had been written so that they were protected from criminal lawsuits
by their clients
(as long as they did not inform their clients of their rights), however,
civil lawsuits
are another story. I am looking to make things very uncomfortable for the people who
wrecked my life. In my case, they never
told me I had the option of taking them to Court. If they had, the
“Learned Helplessness” they had given me, would have protected
them from a lawsuit.
I had rationalized how
DSS, DSPandS and DRC were
helping me with my education.
I was sure they would never choose to deny me accommodation for my disability, though
that was exactly what they had done to me. It has taken me five years to get past the
feelings of helplessness and despair that DSS,
DSPandS and DRC used to stop
any of their clients from speaking about their treatment. As I have noted before,
they are protected from prosecution for Psychological Torture, they inflict upon their
clients, by the way the ADA has been written. In other words, they are free to wreck
their clients lives, as they have done to my life.
Two Pages to go.
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24 years of emotional trauma at the college and university.
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I was the top student in Organic Chemistry
at UC Santa Cruz in the summer of 1982.
A year later, in mid-summer 1983, a 165 foot rock climbing fall did not end my life or paralyze me, despite
breaking my back. I woke six weeks later to an unforseen lifestyle change. While unconcious, I had been transfomed
into a criminal who survived a traumatic accident with a head injury.
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As I have never been imprisoned: “Social Isolation” and
“Learned Helplessness” were two new concepts to me. These two policies
would ruin 32 years of my life;
leaving me with no way to
afford a family, few friends and a terrible self image.
After 24 years of schooling, I am disabled, poor, unemployed and unemployable, because I was fooled into
believing staff people were interested in helping educate me.
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Page 4
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In Fall 1984, my 24 year educational experience of paranoid loneliness and social isolation from my peers
and the people around me was begun at the UC campus.
The organizations that help disabled students with their education,
attempted to make me go away by denying me accommodation for my disability.
This was a deliberate event. I can not imagine why anyone would treat a law abiding American Citizen
like a criminal, though I have tried.
The Staff people that did this to me were (and are) sadistic monsters who broke the law.
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My diploma in
Biochemistry.
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24 years of psychological torture, “Social Isolation” and
“Learned Helplessness” for the final year of my degree.
They had conditioned me in 1984/1985 to get used to being treated badly (sadistically) by them and I no longer protested anything
about my treatment after initially being attacked whenever I had.
The staff I was forced to work with at the UC campus and the Community College ignored parts of the ADA from its
passage in 1990, until Spring 2008 (one of them bragged to me in October 2009),
I finally realized these people had no intention of ever doing their job and I finally dropped out of school.
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My life is really sad, isolated and depressing,
because I refused to give up hope for my rehabilitation. I kept looking forwards,
trying to ignore the the subtle, but constant, sadism from the staff that were helping me and would not drop out of school for 24 years.
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What these Staff people did to me is not unique to the UC campus and the community
college I attended. The attitude they were using to justify their actions was evident wherever I looked on the Internet.
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Decriminalize head injury.
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- TBI survivors are not criminals or freaks - educate us.
- Toughen and Enforce The ADA.
- Make feedback mandatory.
- Make staff accountable for their actions.
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There is strong correlation between cell phone use and brain cancer. Follow these links (54) to scientific studies and opinions.
Links 1 - 27 or
Links 28 - 54
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As a head injury survivor, I needed
help with my education, but that
is not what I got.
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You are here
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Public employess chose to deprive the human race of a needed, dedicated and intelligent, cancer researcher (me), because they could.
These people intentionally ruined my chances to live a normal life and provide for a family because I am a head injury survivor.
Please help me expose them. Send links of this website with a brief explanation to every US government agency,
US government official, US government employee, anyone and/or media sources or organizations you can think of.
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