[blparent] blindparent RE3 kids being SNEAKY

Wed Jan 8 16:45:05 UTC 2014

My boyfriend and I got into a discussion that bordered on an argument 
recently about the overprotection because of blindness versus family respect 
thing.  At the time I thought it was important, but looking back now, it 
seems kind of pointless.  It had to do with toys strewn all over the floor. 
I slipped and fell on a plastic tote lid and twisted my knee, and my 
boyfriend got all over the kids to pick up the toys.  His fallback slogan 
was, "When Mom gets hurt, I get mad!"  That annoyed the hell out of me.  He 
was in my corner, and I guess that should have made me feel supported, which 
was his intent.  It bugged him that I didn't take it that way.  But my 
feeling was that we pick up toys because we respect the family space, not 
because poor blind Mom could fall and get hurt.  Anybody could fall and get 
hurt.  I pointed out that my boyfriend has a torn ACL in his knee; one wrong 
step and he could be in surgery.  I also pointed out that I wasn't the one 
who took a misstep off a curb last spring and pulled a hamstring, then spent 
the next six or eight weeks in not-so-silent suffering.  He didn't like 
that, but he couldn't deny it.  He countered with the fact that I twisted my 
knee on a toy, which I had injured the first time also falling on a toy. 
True, but I had also re-injured it in between those times playing with the 
dog in the snow.  Irrelevant, he said.  Maybe, but my point was that I could 
hurt my nee doing other things.  Anyway, all this was to say that anyone 
could get hurt if the floor was left a mess, not just Mom, so the toys 
needed to be picked up.  I brought it up to illustrate the fact that the 
lines between saying something should be done because Mom or Dad is blind, 
or saying they should be done for other reasons, can get kind of blurry. 
Sometimes the one who is doing the talking might not even be clear on his or 
her motives.  Sometimes the motives are perfectly clear, like they were with 
my boyfriend, but sometimes they're murky, like in the movie Rebecca 
mentioned.  So much of what we do and think is so automatic.

Jo Elizabeth

Truth is tough. It will not break, like a bubble, at a touch; nay, you may 
kick it about all day like a football, and it will be round and full at 
evening.--Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
-----Original Message----- 
From: Star Gazer
Sent: Wednesday, January 08, 2014 7:59 AM
To: 'Blind Parents Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [blparent] blindparent RE3 kids being SNEAKY

Dawn, your dad sounds very old school. He's probably got things sorted in
his head as "boy jobs" and "girl jobs" and since you're a woman, you can't
teach the "boy jobs" as well as a man could.
You'll see a lot of this if you watch tv shows from the 1950's, and it comes
across in some literature too. I'm thinking specifically of Beverly Cleary's
books that were written in the 1950's.
What your dad may be trying to impart to your boys are skills that they will
need to maintain a family as men. These skills are in some ways very
different from your role as a woman. He may not even realize this is what
he's doing, it's so hard wired.
What I'm getting at is that he isn't really teaching about dishes and
shoveling.
He's mentioning your blindness because it's easy for him to do that.
Your brother has daughters, and he has what we call an "intact" family, so
your dad will relate differently.
Your dad isn't your boys' parent, but men and women do relate to children
differently. I'm trying to think of the movie that conveys this real well.
There's a 1960's version and a current one, the 1960's version is better.

-----Original Message-----
From: blparent [mailto:blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of dawn
stumpner
Sent: Tuesday, January 7, 2014 5:37 PM
To: blparent at nfbnet.org
Subject: [blparent] blindparent RE3 kids being SNEAKY

Hi, Jo Elizabeth and Everyone,

     Yes, there have been a few times that my sons throughout the years have
used the fact that I couldn't see to try to get away with small things, for
example, trying to leave the house with their hair a mess or high water
pants on their way to school or pushing a bunch of stuff under the bed when
cleaning their rooms thinking that I wouldn't check.  Most of the time, I
figure out what they are doing, and we've talked about how sneaking, whether
it be getting around my lack of vision or sneaking in any other way, is a
form of dishonesty, is hurtful, and lessens trust.  I think this message has
gotten through, and the kids don't do any more sneaking than I've heard of
my sighted peers talking about their kids doing or remember my brother, my
cousins, and me doing with our parents.  I feel I've done a good job over
all in imparting the lessons I would like my kids to carry through life with
them.  They are loving, curious about the world around them, generous, and
for the most part cooperative and able to put themselves in other people's
shoes.
    What bothers me sometimes is my dad's reaction to my lack of sight.  On
the one hand, he was very supportive of me as I grew up, including letting
me do things like travel overseas that he wasn't always comfortable with.
On the other hand, perhaps because he is of an older generation, I'm a
woman, I'm divorced, and I'm blind, he sometimes acts more like the primary
parent when he visits than just a grandpa.  I have mentioned to him that he
yells at my kids for things that he doesn't yell at my brother's daughters
for, and he responds  that my nieces have two sighted parents, and that he
feels like he has to correct my boys because I can't always see what they do
and my husband isn't there now and wasn't on top of things before the
divorce.  Each thing that the boys don't do thoroughly, such as leaving
their dishes on the table, needing to be told to clean their rooms again and
again, or having to be told to shovel the driveway more thoroughly seems to
him to be because I can't see what kind of a job they have done.  My sighted
friends deal with the same issues as me needing to tell their kids to do a
job twice because it wasn't done well the first time, etc., but although he
says that I do a good job and can do things as well as other people, other
things he says make me feel like what I'm doing isn't enough and is somehow
inferior to what I would be able to do if I could see and that the kids
would not try to get away with anything if I could see.
     Sorry for the long message.  Your email just made me think of some of
these related issues for me, and it's hard for me to be concise about them.
Have any of you ever had difficulty with family members or friends thinking
that what you do is either amazing when it's just ordinary or that any
difficulties you have are because of lack of sight and that they need to be
there to make sure everything turns out okay?

Dawn

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