[blindkid] Explaining blindness to a child

[Richard Holloway]

I think a detailed explanation may have to wait for a while-- I suspect at age four is will be more important to reassure him that he is still loved and will still have all of you and can still do the things he loves to do-- there will just have to be some adaptations made.

It seems incredible looking back now, but initially we were concerned that our child might not be happy or able to get by on her own when she was grown because we just didn't have any good information. We didn't know of many blind adults and really didn't know anything of or about blind children at all. I was also really concerned as to how we would be able to solve a great many problems when of course most of them had long since been solved-- we just needed to learn about the existing solutions, and modern technology is bringing about more and more solutions all of the time...

I think one thing that I realized pretty quickly was that many of the blind adults which stuck in my memory were the ones who had a struggle getting through life in large part because they weren't terribly well trained in the alternative skills of blindness. Thinking back, it sort of makes sense-- the people with good training and skills all blend in with the rest of society. At first, I'd have been more likely to remember a guy with a cane looking for a handout for example than my mother's blind colleague and fellow college professor whom I had seen all my life growing up. My point is there's no reason why your nephew should not be happy and successful in life, and he doesn't have to be a college professor or a doctor or lawyer or climb mountains or do any of those things to be happy, but there are plenty of blind folks who do all of those things, so if he doesn't end up doing any of them, it will likely be because he chooses not to, not because of vision issues.

Though she's quite a bit younger, much like Carol's daughter, our daughter has been blind since shortly after birth. She has no recollection of vision but now at age 8, she is asking questions and trying to more fully grasp this thing called vision which her friends have and which she'd like to have too, but she still laughs and plays and enjoys life and does well in school, and she understand that some people see and some don't, just like some people can hear and some can't, and so forth.

The things our blind child does aren't usually very different from sighted kids-- they're just done in different ways than the way her sighted friends, as well as her sighted older sister and younger brother do them. If you have any specific questions feel free to contact me off list. I know it is a complicated time to go through, but it will all settle down and work out.

Richard




On Sep 16, 2010, at 11:57 PM, Carol Castellano wrote:

> Hi Dina,
> 
> Altho this is not our family's experience (our daughter has been blind almost since birth), we have heard and seen that the kids adjust pretty quickly.  I think the key is discovering that blind people can get an education, go to college, get a job, have a family--basically have a normal life.  Then the next thing is to learn about the techniques blind people use to accomplish tasks.
> 
> If you and your family find out about the abilities of blind people and can learn positive language with which to speak about blindness, then you will be able to help your nephew make the adjustment and still feel whole and complete as a person.
> 
> Check out Good Stories in the Information about Blindness section of www.blindchildren.org.  I think you will enjoy it.
> 
> Carol
> 
> Carol Castellano
> National Organization of Parents of Blind Children
> 973-377-0976
> carol_castellano at verizon.net
> www.nopbc.org
> 
> At 02:08 PM 9/15/2010, you wrote:
>> My 4 year old nephew is rapidly losing his vision.  The doctors cannot figure out why other than his optic nerves are atrophied and it looks as though there is nothing to be done.  We are imaging the day when his sight goes completely.  We really need to hear from parents who have gone through this and can help us figure out how to explain it to him.  This has happened very quickly and we can hardly explain it to ourselves much less a 4 year old.
>> 
>> Can anyone share their story with us?
>> 
>> Thank you!
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