[humanser] Article published by an online newspaper

[JD TOWNSEND]

David:

This is a wonderfujl article.  Thank you for sharing it.


JD Townsend, LCSW
Daytona Beach, Florida, Earth, Sol System
Helping the light dependent to see.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "David r. Stayer" <davidandloristayer at verizon.net>
To: "NFB human Services Division" <humanser at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Thursday, December 31, 2009 12:10 PM
Subject: [humanser] Article published by an online newspaper


>I hesitate to post this, but it hopefully will help others who are blind.
> David Stayer was literally pronounced dead before he was born.
> When his mother went into labor more than three months early in April
> 1940, the doctor
> at the hospital wrote out a death certificate.  Stayer was born weighing
> one and
> a half pounds, he spent more than six months in the hospital, and it
> took him till
> his first birthday to reach five pounds.   People thought his mother was
> carrying
> around a doll.
> Stayer, who has lived in Merrick for nearly four decades, has also been
> blind since
> birth.  But Stayer's story is not of tragedy, but one of not just
> overcoming challenges,
> but soaring past them.
> "I believe that one of the purposes I have is to show people that
> blindness doesn't
> have to stop you from accomplishing things," said Stayer, from the couch
> of the Merrick
> home he has shared with wife of 37 years, Lori.
> The Town of Hempstead recently honored Stayer at its "Make A Difference"
> awards ceremony,
> which recognized 13 people who have dedicated their lives to enriching
> the lives
> of others.
> Stayer, the first disabled professional ever hired by Nassau County,
> worked for 37
> years as a senior medical social worker at the Meadowbrook Nassau
> University Medical
> Center.
> "People would come into the hospital concerned with how they looked,"
> Stayer recalled,
> "but I couldn't tell that.  I've always tried to use my blindness as a
> positive."
> Born in Baltimore, Stayer moved to New York at the age of four because
> his parents
> believed the state offered better opportunities for blind children.  The
> oldest of
> five children, Stayer graduated from Brooklyn College and then went on
> to the New
> York University Graduate School of Social Work, where of the three blind
> students
> admitted he was the only one to finish the program in two years.
> Told to get a job before his second year of graduate school, Stayer had
> to call 40
> hospitals before he got an interview, a victim of a society that
> stigmatizes blindness.
> "I think there are worse things than not seeing," Stayer said, "but most
> people don't.
> People fear AIDS and then blindness."
> Stayer met Lori at a singles gathering in 1971.
> "She saw me before I saw her," said Stayer, cracking up laughing and
> slapping his
> hand onto his black trousers.
> A year later, the Stayers were married.  They are expecting their 11th
>  grandchild in March.  Their two daughters are due to deliver a day
> apart, one with
> her ninth child and the other with her second.
> Lori Stayer said her husband rarely gets depressed about anything and
> she only gets
> upset when others seem to take pity on her.
> "One time in the supermarket, a lady said to me, 'I feel so sorry for
> you,' and I'm
> thinking, 'Why?" she said.
> David Stayer, 69, retired in 2002, but he keeps busy as the president of
> both the
> National Federation of the Blind Human Services Division and the Greater
> Long Island
> Chapter of the NFB.
> Stayer also leads the Freeport Community Chorale, with whom he
> entertains the masses
> with his booming tenor voice.
> "He is a wonderful musician," said Jeff Bienenfeld, who nominated Stayer
> for the
> town's "Make A Difference" award.  "We can hear him singing from the
> back of the
> synagogue.  He tries not to overwhelm everyone, but somehow everyone
> hears him."
> Bienenfeld called Stayer "tremendously inspirational to all of us" and
> one of the
> most delightful people he has ever met.
> Stayer said he sometimes still faces discrimination when he's out with
> his wife and
> people talk to her and ignore him or at restaurants when the waiter asks
> Lori, "What
> does he want?"
> But Stayer does not want sympathy; he just wants to continue showing the
> world that
> sight does not make the man.
> "I've accepted it as part of my life," Stayer said of his blindness,
> "and the best
> way to combat that is to prove what I can do."
> For someone born weighing about as much as two apples, Stayer has
> certainly grown
> into a much bigger, and inspirational, man.
> Email
>
> -- 
> Each day is a precious gift
>  David R. Stayer, LCSW
>
>
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