Chapter 1
The invisible Lives of Adult with Learning Disabilities

The stories that follow were derived from interviews conducted at Destined’s offices in Great James Street, during September 2009 and June 2011. All those who took part did so willingly, and they subsequently approved the final text of their stories prior to publication.The terminology used here varies slightly – with some interviewees using the term "learning difficulty”, others using “learning disability” and others again using both. In most cases, the term used by reporters was “learning difficulty”. What is very apparent through these stories is how society’s response to people with learning difficulties has changed, mostly for the better, over the past 60 years. So to give the reader a sense of that, we decided to present the stories in chronological order, with the eldest interviewees first.