The best piece of advice I can give you is WEAR YOUR SUNFLOWER LANYARD and on arrival, draw attention to it - explain to a staff memeber what your hidden disability is, what issues it might cause you and any special consideration you would appreciate. They are likely to be only too willing to assist in any way they can.
Other things to expect:
* some archives have special little cushions or mats that you place on the table, and they expect you to rest all delicate and fragile documents on these. Bear in mind that the documents they are allowing you to access may be very old, and all are irreplaceable. The archivists are keenly aware that every time they are handled they suffer a little more damage. This damage is incremental and irreversible; but they are charged with trying to make sure that the documents remain available for future generations of researchers in 100, 200, 300 years time. Any rules and regulations are to try to ensure that this is possible, so please do your best to comply.
* old books, particularly leather bound volumes, can be stiff and difficult to keep open at the pages you are consulting. They often have strings of weighted beads which you can lay on the ends of the pages to hold the book open at the right page. Make it your practice ALWAYS to use them.
* it can be difficult to keep your place in a manuscript volume consisting of lists of names etc. and it is very tempting to run your finger along or down the page. Resist this temptation. A large sheet of paper (coloured if you like) can be laid over the page as a mask, and gradually pulled down as you read. This does far less damage than finger oils.
* in some archives that I have visisted, large blocks of the records you are likely to want to access (such as parish records) were microfilmed in the 1970s and 80s, and rather than provide you with the volume you will be expected to view it on a microfiche reader. Using these is quite an art, and you may take a while to get the hang of it.
* most archives have some volumes that are on open shelves that you can just go and pull out for yourself, and others that you have to request by filling in a request slip and they will go and fetch it for you. Do not feel diffdent about making requests and "creating work for them" ... this is the work that they are paid for, and they are happy to do it for you. Make sure you check the arrangements first though, and find out how many you can request at once, how many volumes you can have in your possession at one time, and how and where to return volumes once you have finished with them. Perhaps ask them to show you how to fill in a slip (they'll be happy to do this), and also ask whether they expect you to return open-access volumes to them for re-shelving, or to re-shelve them yourself (again, practice differs from archive to archive)
* Finally, remember that you are dealing with people who are experts in reading old documents. It is their area of expertise, their passion, and like most people they love sharing their knowledge and learning. If you are having difficulty reading an old manuscript entry, don't hesitate to ask them to have a look and see what they make of it. That shows them that you value them as something other than glorified librarians (not that there's anything wrong with being a librarian ... it's a highly skilled job in itself ... but you see what I mean).
I think it's absolutely marvellous that you're biting this particular bullet, and wish you the very best.
