Ten non-traditional/weird things I brought to college that have really helped me

Shortly before my second year of college, I received a few orientation and mobility lessons for learning how to navigate with low vision and a blindness cane. These lessons were helpful for learning general travel skills, but I noticed they didn’t get into specifics about…

When I was cleaning out my dorm room a few years ago, I found four identical-looking bronze keys and had no idea what they unlocked. While I was able to figure out the purpose of one key, the purpose of the other three keys remains…

I started using the Stylebook app during my freshman year of college to keep my clothes organized and put together outfits inspired by Pinterest without having to take several items out of my tiny dorm closet or creating a mess in my dorm room. While…

Products that help to make a dorm room completely dark for college students with migraines, based on my own on-campus experience

When I first moved into my new dorm in undergrad, I felt super overwhelmed as I tried to keep track of a ton of information while living on my own. By the time I would get back from classes, my visual fatigue and cognitive fatigue…

When I was in college, I found out that one of my friends had recently started using a white cane/blindness cane when I tripped over it while walking in the dining hall. Another time I helped a different friend look for their cane after they…

When I lived in college dorm/on-campus housing, the resident advisors for my floor would create dorm door signs and dorm door decorations for students that included their name and a fun design. There are a lot of creative dorm door decorations, and I received an…

Even though I didn’t live in a mobility access/wheelchair accessible dorm on campus during undergrad, I still used several dorm room disability hacks to make it easier and more comfortable to move around my dorm. As a student diagnosed with Chiari Malformation and then-undiagnosed POTS,…

During the last few semesters of college, my disability and chronic illness made it difficult for me to walk to classes on my own. Even with the use of guides and mobility aids, I would often show up to class exhausted, since I had used…

Ever wonder “how does a blind person use the bathroom?” or “how does someone who is visually impaired take a shower?” I’ve had many people ask me these questions, including children, teachers, friends, and even people I shared a bathroom with in student housing. Like…

While living on campus, I would typically order items online and have them delivered to me instead of going to physical stores. Since I have low vision and an unpredictable chronic illness, ordering items online in college required less energy than making an off-campus trip,…