It's ridiculous how hard it is to get services. Hope your junior year is going well.

Interestingly, I hate playing music. I'm one of the few blind people I know who does. Though it could be because I was forced into it so much as a kid; "You're blind, you have to play music!" These days, I flatly refuse to have anything to do with music production, singing, or playing an instrument. I do listen to a huge variety and amount of music though.

> Braille isn't offered to me because I "see too well"

You can change that yourself, and now (before going off to college) is an excellent time to start too. There are many self-learning resources for braille, may be braille instruction through blindness organizations in your area, and you are now at an age where you can advocate for your right to braille instruction and materials in school. https://nfb.org/braille-and-vi-students

You could also choose to attend a summer program training you in blindness skills (including braille) as well as college preparedness, some examples: http://cocenter.org/our-programs/ http://www.louisianacenter.org/step-program/

But even if you choose not to use braille, are you using audio such as text to speech or audiobooks to read? If no, why not?

The DMV should have the forms you need, I was able to print out mine online and had the doctor fill out the medical section. I took it into the DMV and came out with a blue placard!

Now everyone wants to take me to the market when they do their shopping!

You can apply for a handicapped sticker through your state department of transportation; one of the qualifications (at least for here) is needing a can or assistance to cross parking lots/etc.

SSDI is Social Security Disability benefits; as you work and pay into Social Security, you contribute towards a monthly disability payment if you stop working (or work under a certain amount due to a dsiability like blindness).

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Legally blind here, used to be totally sighted.
I think it varies for each person. I happened to start losing my vision at a convenient point in my life because i was starting to grow and develop my identity then. My vision started changing a few years back when i was in my mid-teens, so i still had access to resources (o&m, daily living skills training, basic tech and labeling training) from my school district and youth organizations for the blind. Because i was sighted, i had a point of reference to determine when i wasn't being treated fairly or given sufficient accomodations. And since i had a bit rough start transitioning into the visual impairment world (learning how to explain my situation to others when i didn't entirely understand or feel comfortable with it), i was forced to quickly learn self advocacy. Unfortunately, the world that we live in is not perfect, and we all will inevitably be discriminated against at some point in time. But, because i had to learn how to fight for access suddenly and randomly, i feel more prepared to handle the "real world."

But, i acknowledge that things are different for every person, based off of the resources and support available to them, the time they start losing their vision, their personal talents and skills, etc.

Having been bourn blind might have made things easier, mobility with the cane or even just knowing where things are by sound would probably be way more natural, and learning brail young would have been better, but there are things I'm glad I saw, and things I understand I probably wouldn't otherwise.

I think it would have been easier if I was born blind; I was born with 10% or 20/200 visual acuity and was happy with it.