[Nfbc-info] Changing What it Means to Be Blind

Mon Jan 9 01:08:46 UTC 2012

Absolutely!

Sent from my iPhone

On Jan 8, 2012, at 4:50 PM, "Mary Willows" <mwillows at sbcglobal.net> wrote:

> Wow, Serena.  That was really powerful.  There are so many people who will read what you wrote below and find that this is a life changing e-mail message.  Can we use it on our website as a personal testimony?
> 
> Gratefully Yours,
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Serena Olsen" <olsen.serena at gmail.com>
> To: "NFB Chapter Presidents discussion list" <chapter-presidents at nfbnet.org>
> Cc: "nfbc-east-bay" <nfbc-east-bay at googlegroups.com>; "nfbc-info" <nfbc-info at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Sunday, January 08, 2012 4:16 PM
> Subject: [Nfbc-info] Changing What it Means to Be Blind
> 
> 
>> [This is a response to an email thread on the Chapter Presidents
>> Listserve that I wanted to also share with my own chapter and
>> affiliate.]
>> 
>> Hi Listers,
>> 
>> I have been enjoying the conversations arising from Mary Kendricks'
>> request for feedback for her research, and am extra motivated to get
>> my two cents in after reading Michael Barber's recommendation to
>> listen to Dr. Jernigan's "Dishwashing Tapes" seminar (I found the link
>> at http://www.nfb.org/nfb/Audio-Video_Center.asp), which I'm sure I've
>> heard before, but revisiting items like these is always great.
>> 
>> Changing what it means to be blind, for me, is blurring the lines
>> between and changing people's misperceptions about the discrimination
>> between "total" and "low-vision".  I have quite a bit of useable
>> vision and my condition, Stargardts, deteriorated slowly over time.
>> Consequently, I was never seriously thought of as **blind** and passed
>> for sighted all of my young adult life.  I struggled through too many
>> years of college using no adaptive techniques save an old camera lens
>> used as a magnifying glass.  It wasn't until my early-to-mid twenties
>> that I miraculously became connected with the Braille Institute and
>> began to learn about magnification devices, campus DSP services, and
>> the Department of Rehabilitation.  All this was an improvement, of
>> course, and the glass ceiling I had come to feel pressed against but
>> had no idea there was anything I could do about it, loosened a little.
>> However, by the time I finished graduate school at nearly 30, I had
>> chronic headaches, backaches, neck pain and all the other discomfort
>> and indignity that comes with perpetual stooping and squinting.  And I
>> was learning to acknowledge the difficult fact that, in all my years
>> of college, I could never really keep up with the readings.  I didn't
>> even know how to touch type until my last semester of graduate school.
>> So maybe I was doing more than all my sighted friends and family put
>> together--higher education, international travel, etc., but I knew I
>> had to work at least twice as hard and still not really keep up with
>> my peers.  How could I possibly leave the comfortable bubble of
>> academia and truly have a successful career?  All of the same
>> insecureties I experienced before acquiring low-vision techniques were
>> creeping back.
>> 
>> In 2004, in my late twenties, I finally encountered the Federation,
>> spent quality time with competent blind individuals who were doing
>> even more ambitious things than I, and realized I had a lot more to
>> learn.  I attended the Louisiana Center for the Blind in 2007, learned
>> to use and love JAWS & braille, surprised myself in the woodshop,
>> conquered my greatest nemesis, cane travel, and learned to consciously
>> and unconsciously use the rich diversity of non-visual information
>> that is in the environment all around us.
>> 
>> Do I use my residual vision?  Sure.  I just have a better quiver of
>> tools to draw from and many more options to problem solve all those
>> day-to-day and even bigger life issues that we all face as blind
>> people.  I have a better understanding of exactly how much I **can't**
>> see and I find that, more often than not, non-visual techniques are
>> more efficient, and   best of all, they allow me to stand and sit
>> straight--great for your posture & body, even better for your
>> confidence and sense of well-being.  The NFB has brought dignity and
>> grace into my life and made me a more effective, efficient, and
>> competent person.  Especially in the current economic climate, we must
>> be able to compete effectively with our sighted peers more than ever
>> and ensure that employers see past our blindness and primarily as
>> qualified to do the job, regardless of how we choose to do it.
>> 
>> In all that I do to give back to the NFB and the organized blind
>> movement, the mission I hold nearest and dearest to my heart is
>> convincing both blind and sighted alike that non-visual technique,
>> training, and technology is as vitally important to someone with
>> residual vision as it is to someone who is totally blind.  The notion
>> that "(I/he/she/you) can still see and don't need (braille, a cane,
>> JAWS, etc.)" is a frame of mind that will only cement in that glass
>> ceiling.  It is a mentality that I have not only encountered with
>> low-vision folks and the general public, but was implicit in the
>> services I received from the Department of Rehabilitation, and I feel
>> it unnecessarily hindered my progress towards full employment.  Of
>> course, on this listserve, I am mostly preaching to the choir, but
>> this is a theme that I find myself coming back to over and over and
>> over again and if the statistic that only about 10% of blind people
>> are totally blind, then we have a lot of work to do.  How can we
>> really empower blind people if they don't first identify as blind and
>> see & experience for themselves how empowering it is to be able to do
>> things effectively without taxing their residual vision?  Dr. Jernigan
>> comes to this in "Dishwashing Tapes," and my mission is to, first and
>> foremost, lead by example, and secondarily, to take advantage of as
>> many teachable moments as I can in my daily life to demonstrate that
>> yes, I "can still see some," but choose to use the same skills as a
>> totally blind person, because it is more effective.
>> 
>> As of 2010, I work for a living, pay taxes, made my first stock, 401k,
>> and IRA investments, am paying down debts, and have the relative
>> luxury of a chronic Starbucks habit, getting semi-regular manicures,
>> and going out to eat or otherwise indulging without that heavy stone
>> in the pit of my stomach that my debit card will be declined because
>> my Social Security funds didn't last past the first two weeks of the
>> month.  I am still focused on career development--I still have goals
>> to achieve, but I can honestly say that I have never felt happier or
>> more on track to achieving those goals than I do now.  In the identity
>> struggle over "I'm not blind, I'm not sighted" that so many low-vision
>> people stagnate in, I have learned that it is tremendously more
>> valuable to identify as blind first, and use my residual vision where
>> it's useful and be aware of its limitations.
>> 
>> So much for my two cents--we'll chalk it up to inflation--thanks to
>> all of you who read this far.  I hope it gives some food for thought
>> and helps Mary out with her paper.  Feel free to quote or contact me
>> for more info as needed.
>> 
>> Cheers!
>> 
>> -- 
>> Serena Olsen, MAIPS, NCLB
>> Staff Assistant, Japan Society of Northern California (www.usajapan.org)
>> Braille Instructor, Lions Center for the Blind (www.lbcenter.org)
>> President, NFBC East Bay (nfbc-east-bay at googlegroups.com)
>> 
>> "We are all born to be the hero of our own story." --Deepak Chopra
>> 
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