"From Where I Sit" Video Series

Gloria L's Story — Video Transcript

When I was 14 years old I was a freshman in high school. I was diagnosed with bipolar. It was the worst thing that ever happened to me. I was actually suicidal. My parents called the police and the police brought an ambulance. Throughout high school, it was the worst experience ever. I was hospitalized 5 times and every time was because the medication didn't work. Probably did not have the best education ever. I mean the humiliation, the embarrassment, the shame, the low self esteem the lack of confidence. You know just being different and discriminated against for being different.

My parents are traditional Chinese parents and they did not accept the fact that I was bipolar they didn't accept the fact that I sought counseling and psychiatric help. It was even a pain for my mom to drive me to see a psychologist... to see a counselor. I was ridiculed for that. I was frowned upon for that. I was pretty much on my own; that was the only way that I could cope with my depression, cope with my barriers in order to do what I wanted to do in life, which is succeed academically.

I have a choice of either taking medication to treat my bipolar or treating my ADD. I chose to be treated for bipolar, because I did not want to have crises in my life. And that just leaves me with the inability to focus in school because I have symptoms of ADD.

When I do my reading I can't focus for, I can't focus or comprehend for more than 10 minutes. I would use a program that allow you to scan your books on a scanner and it plops up on the computer screen and then the computer reads to you. That's what helps me and that's what helps me deal with not being able to focus, because okay I am forced to focus. I tried to read an assignment. It was no more than 8 pages - not very long. Maybe the words were very small and condensed. It took me about three hours and I didn't finish reading it. And the next morning I scanned all 8 pages. I read it in less than 15 minutes. And I was thinking to myself "wow, I didn't, I didn't even know that this is the point of the story. I didn't even get that within the three hours at home.

Professors need to understand that if I don't turn in a paper on time or I turn it in one day late, two days late that I didn't start it at the last minute. I started it when the professor assigned the paper. It's just that I stumbled. I had trouble and some do not even sympathize with disabled students.

The handouts with all these smudges and lines and wrinkles and it's just when you photocopy it it comes out all messy. If they're important professors should not give us these dirty scratched up papers. If it's not clean it should be retyped. It's really hard to scan on a scanner and have it being put on the screen. I always have to retype it so I could make the fonts big and small change the fonts and change the color to make it visual for myself. And that's one of the things that sets me back and takes up my time.

I once had a human development professor. I wanted to tell him what was going on with me but it's like the words don't even come out because I was very scared of him because I thought, or in my mind I felt, that I wasn't much of a student.

It would really help if professors understood that they need to slow down their speech. They need to pause at important points. They need to say "okay this is important a, b, and c. This draws a conclusion because of a, b, and c". They need to write on the board more.

What I want to do with a major in psychology and a minor in English is be a high school English teacher or a community college instructor teaching either English or Psychology. I want to get a college education for the sole reason of being a confident person. It's the absolute minimum I expect of myself. I hope I get my PhD one day.