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bright bab undiagnosed as profoundly disabled
unable to play and crawl roll babble sit but button-bright
"not much wrong with her"
The Street, Tankerton, July 1987

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I leapt into mainstream school at 5 already able to chatter using a silly system of spelling felt by my hands-on carers in Nursery home and OT. As my clinical psychologist explains it: it has never been a private language with mother. (Mum is most habituated to me though.)

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Din within turned to choral singing and I turned to John Tavener for help.

I left school, wrote a lot of music, gained entry at 8 to a prestigious London college to work on a special place one day a week alongside undergrads and grads. It made me very happy and I thought I'd found my metier niche and element.

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little girl of 9 proud and confident
naive fool
battle scars to come

soul winging free
sitting on a Hebridean shore summer 1996

paddling at Fidden, my beloved Hebridean shore, summer 1997

sturdy rock-like bro
loves me as I love him
the 2 of us are picnicing in Scotland en route to our Gran's burial service
he wants to be an architect
I want him to be an architect
I want him to be close to me
and shield me from the buffeting bullies of bureaucracy

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c'est moi maintenant!

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