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"Becoming disabled doesn't have to signal the beginning of a dependent and sedentary existence," biologist Susan Yim wrote, having just returned from a weekend ski trip. "It does signal having to figure out new, creative and different ways of doing things."
Twenty-five years ago, Susan was a research assistant at Duke University who ran eight miles every day and enjoyed adventure in the great outdoors. One night she went to bed with a headache and woke the next morning to find she was completely paralyzed and unable to speak. She'd had a brainstem stroke.
Doctors advised Susan's parents to put her in a nursing home because they felt nothing could be done for her. Susan and her parents were determined to prove them wrong. Intensive physical therapy and rehabilitation slowly began to pay off – she could lift her head, move her thumbs, push up on her arms. When she had regained enough motion to communicate by indicating letters on a letter board, her first question, according to her physical therapist, wasn't "Why me?" It was "What do I have left to work with?" She was determined to make the most of the abilities she still had.
Assistive Technology – Primitive Beginnings
"Communication systems, at the time of the onset of my stroke, were largely limited to eye-blink technologies (just dividing the alphabet into columns and blinking when the correct letter was said). Everything was dreadfully slow and frustrating," Susan remembers in an email interview. She knew she had the education and experience to have a career, but first she needed a better interface so she could communicate more easily. That brought her to the Workforce & Technology Center (then called the Maryland Rehabilitation Center) and its Rehabilitation Technology Services (RTS).
Assistive Technology in the Digital Age
RTS outfitted Susan with a personal computer system modified so that she doesn't need to use a keyboard and mouse to navigate it. Instead, using the mobility she's achieved in her thumbs, she uses a microswitch in each hand. Susan's father, who had been in the Navy, helped her learn Morse code, and she uses the dots and dashes system to operate the computer via the microswitches. The computer opened up the world to her once again, and soon led her to a job as a Research Molecular Biologist with the Biodetection team at the U.S. Army's Aberdeen Proving Ground. She works from home at a computer workstation of her own design, abstracting state-of-the-art research in her field for other researchers. She communicates with her office via modem.
Because of gains made in controlling her arm movements after years of rehabilitation, when Susan is away from her computer she's no longer dependent on the eyeblink system of communication. She can point to words and letters on a letter board. Although still a slow method of communication, Susan says it's 10 times faster and less frustrating than the eyeblink method.
As computer technology got better, so did Susan's ability to communicate. "The vast improvements in input switches, Morse code software and adaptive mouse options have made communication a lot faster for me and, therefore improved my quality of life immensely." In 1996, she returned to WTC, where RTS equipped her with a laptop with Morse code input software and voice synthesizer capability. She used the voice synthesizer to successfully defend her Master's thesis in molecular biology at UMBC.
It's Not Always Work
It's not all work for Susan Yim. Even though she's no longer running, this hasn't prevented her from continuing to enjoy adventure in the great outdoors. She's whitewater rafted down the Colorado River and gone tandem skydiving. She's climbed a 200-foot cliff face in the Rockies and finished the annual 63-mile Seagull Century bicycle ride through Maryland's Eastern Shore. And in her more quiet moments, she paints watercolors. Susan's philosophy? "Don't let anybody tell you that you can't do something – of course you can – all things are possible; just probably not in the conventional way." She's planning on rafting the Grand Canyon again next summer. Hiking the Amazonian rainforest and scuba diving in Australia are high up on her life's to-do list.
High-Tech (and Low-Tech) at Home
In 2003, Susan returned to RTS, ready to make the move from living in her parent's home to getting her own place. The RTS staff helped her adapt her new condo to make it easier for her to live on her own, like modifying light switches, designing an emergency call system and other safety systems, and adapting a telephone so she could hear incoming calls.
Not all the assistive technology that helps her through the day is high-tech. Susan's hands stiffen up when they're cold and that makes everyday tasks like eating, using the computer or painting difficult. RTS mounted a standard blow dryer on a counter and outfitted it with an easy on-off switch. Susan uses this simple device to warm her hands and keep them flexible. When asked about other "low-tech" devices she uses, Susan said "We're very big on duct tape around my house! Duct taping wires and switches and buttons where I can reach them. Very high-tech!"
Susan Yim has a sign attached to her computer that reads "Frustration is not an option" and it's this attitude that has helped her literally to scale mountains, even if she has to rely on technology and other modifications to help her do it. "It's a wonderful life, no matter how you have to go through it – doing everything the world has to offer reaffirms your place in humanity – disabled or not."
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