[Diabetes-talk] A Daughter's Story

[Ed Bryant]

Hi Folks,
    You may know we are working on past Voice editions which are not yet on our website.  The following article is from Vol. 9 no. 4, Fall 1994.  
    I wonder how many of us can relate to this story?

Regards,
Ed Bryant

A daughter's story

 

Many people have known the agony of watching a family member waste away from an incurable disease such as cancer.  Many times all even the doctors can do is try to make the sufferer comfortable. Everyone tries to help.  The family draws together in this time of pain.                                                                                                                                  What happens when it is one of your own stricken, and you are blind?  When your own family hasn't learned that blindness is not synonymous with inability?  We know education is critical, and stories like the following remind us why.                                      Olivia Ostergaard, Treasurer of the National Federation of the Blind of California Diabetics Chapter, lived through such a situation.  Although she had been living independently for years, her own family, believing that "a blind person couldn't handle it anyway," would not allow her to help care for her diabetic mother, whose cancer had become terminal.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 There is no good reason to bar any capable person from caring for a stricken loved one.  In a time of such agony, the expression of ancient prejudices about the blind compounds the pain.   "Imagine not being allowed to cook a simple soup, because someone was afraid you'd burn it!  Imagine total strangers invading your territory, when you should be able to take charge of the situation..." says Ostergaard.                                          When Olivia's younger (sighted) brother was given power of attorney over their mother's affairs, Olivia felt left out and abandoned.  As she states:                         "When we went with mother to the doctor, my brother asked if she was terminal.  The doctor denied it, and ordered more tests.  I privately protested, because my brother wasn't seeing what I was seeing.  He was still living in his fantasy that our mother was going to be all right.  I knew better.  I knew just by the way she was acting.  Her thinking wasn't clear, sometimes.  My brother wouldn't listen to me.  I was his blind sister, "who didn't know anything".                                                                                                                                      Four months later Olivia and her brother lost their mother to terminal cancer.  Their agony needs no reinforcement here--but a simple point needs making:  Blind folks can handle adversity!  In such a situation, the burden can be eased by allowing ALL family members to carry their share of it.   Knowledge is power.