My life been a series of dark places I was born with cerebral palsy so I was born socially isolated and disadvantage due to my speech and general disability I was also put into special schools, try to think of your special ed class and multiply that by 100 that was my school at first 3-11 grade. there all I did was color and basic reading Abc's and counting so I was with people who were profoundly retarded, some were blind and deaf so I never wanted to be like this. Retarded to me was being branded as unless and a drain on society. I knew at that age I never wanted to become that. I had my brother and sister to teach me about social norms and what so I knew what was socially appropriate behavior for the most part. Wore a helmet too(really) When I went to middle school I was mainstream for part of the day so I was with normal kids for part of the day so I did make friends but not life long friends. I never had a life long friends actually. But I had friends. And I had science and social studies with the normal kids. In the summer I had tutoring for reading and math(my mom made me) so I got my love for reading and knowledge from that. High school I went to a special high school. Higher functions than the school before but not like a normal high school. I just f around because the work was easy and I didn't care about anything because most people were retarded in my eyes some. That was until my junior year of high school when I had to take a battery of test for services. So my darkest place was my junior year of high school when I found out I came out as retarded in the tests, functioning retarded but still retarded. Apart of my soul died that day and apart of me. I had a girlfriend at the time that kept me from killing myself. I went on to college(got in) and took courses my math skills keep me from getting that degree. I am still alone sometimes I got one or two friends(no girlfriend) but I know people in Iraq and the middle east have it worst they battle for their lives sometimes even in America people go hungry and homeless. I volunteer at a soup kitchen when I have time along with being politically active. If I can inspire one person with this post then I did my good deed (sorry for the grammatical errors if any and typos I am up typing this for you)