[stylist] To ponder- canes and traveling

[Anita Ogletree]

Bridgit,

I have heard that a lot of blind people opt to wear dark shades 
to protect their eyes.  My problem with that is this: I have been 
using that part of my vision all of my life.  I love that I can 
see the sun light (especially when I can catch it when it peeps 
in slowbby through a slight part in the curtains or blinds).
When I look around a room (like I am doing now as I write), I can 
pick up the colorful furniture in the living room.  The walls are 
painted white in the living room but my furniture (if I can 
remember correctly) is a darker color that I have just decided 
not to try to guess because I will probably be wrong.  But if I 
were to wear dark shades, the shadows get a little darker and I 
feel crazed.  i also get a little dizzy.  When I was in school 
out in California, I was given orientation and mobility training 
on campus.  I did ol up until I started experiencing dizziness.
I was told that my equilibrium was thrown off due to an inner ear 
infection which occurred if I had a cobbd or a sinus infection.  
It in happened very frequently back then and it is one of the 
reasons I withdrew from school.  I do not have that problem as 
much anymore and possibly not at all.  I believe I mentioned that 
my doctors told me that I had developed this nerve condition 
usually brought on by stffess.  Between trying to navigate around 
campus, trying to study without adequate or efficient support was 
very stressful.
I can walk with a sighted guide and sometimes I have been told 
that I am pushing them.  But what they didn't understand is that 
I had no control over what was happening nor was I aware that I 
was doing so.  It is almost impossible for me to walk around a 
track for exercise or anything else with my cane and I don't tend 
to sway to one side or another.
No one has ever told me this might be related to the 
lightstobject perception I have.

Anita

> ----- Original Message -----
>From: Bridgit Pollpeter <bpollpeter at hotmail.com
>To: <stylist at nfbnet.org
>Date sent: Mon, 11 Feb 2013 07:04:47 -0600
>Subject: [stylist] To ponder- canes and traveling

>Anita,

>In our own homes most of us cane users won't use it, but anytime 
I leave
>the house, I use it.  I don't always use it at my parents or 
in-laws
>house because both houses are familiar enough that it's like my 
own
>home, but if I leave their house, I once again have my cane; 
especially
>the in-laws as they live on 90 acres of land, grin.  If a huge 
family
>event is happening and a lot of people are around, I will use my 
cane in
>the houses though.

>I think I might understand what you mean about the light 
perceptions and
>shadows.  I have both, though the shadows are just swirling blobs 
of
>dark, and I have what I call TV fuzz all the time, and I can 
actually
>get dizzy when walking, and I have often wondered if it's from 
trying to
>focus on any light and/or shadows in my line of sight, so to 
speak.  I
>actually walk better if closing my eyes, which means I wear 
sunglasses a
>lot when moving about, both for this and to block out light as 
any light
>bothers my eyes.  I don't always feel a center of gravity either 
when
>moving around a lot.  I tend to do a lot of veering and have been 
known
>to turn around without being aware I have done so.  Like you, I 
will find
>wide open spaces like parking lots or parks more difficult to 
keep a
>straight line in than areas that are more closed in or populated 
with
>people.  I've had extensive training with the cane, and my 
husband in
>fact has taught cane travel, and I've been told my technique is 
great, I
>just have these weird issues withnot feeling grounded.  One 
thought has
>been that I have above average hearing (this was tested long 
before I
>was blind) and maybe my body is responding to echolocation, but 
I'm not
>always processing the information I get mentally.  When a wall of 
sound
>and sensation is hurdling at you, it can be a lot to take in.

>I'm much better now at traveling, and I have to go a lot of 
places on my
>own, so I have had to make the adjustment, but I do admit that 
travel
>has been one of the more difficult skills to adopt after losing 
my
>vision.  Like I said, the skill in and of itself I'm not too bad 
at, but
>something tends to happen that can make the experience more 
trying at
>times.  I have met much worse travelers and I have met better 
travelers,
>like my husband who can get dropped off in the middle of no-where 
and
>find his way home in a relatively short time.  Yeah, try living 
with
>that, LOL!

>I do understand the world spatially though.  I am confused by 
blind
>people I have met who don't seem to have a spatial understanding 
of the
>world at all.  I have encountered several blind people who will 
walk into
>a room, and you can tell them this or that is at the front of the 
room,
>which is straight ahead, and they still don't understand what 
this
>means.  Or people who don't seem able to take in their 
surroundings in
>order to navigate.  Like sounds or smells or sensations.  Like 
when I was
>at university, there was an out-door fountain that splashed 
during the
>warm months, and was therefore a great landmark when the weather 
was
>nice.  Or I would take this short-cut between two buildings to 
get around
>campus, and I knew I was approaching the correct sidewalk because 
the
>sound grew more muted between those buildings.  Or if cutting 
through the
>middle of campus, I knew when I had found the wheelchair ramp as 
opposed
>to the stairs because of the incline.  Various things like this.  
I've met
>several people who don't seem to collect and process information 
in this
>manner.  True, some haven't been trained with a cane, but some 
have, and
>they still find this difficult.  I've never quite understood the
>confusion over straight ahead or forward and backwards or follow 
the
>sound of this, the smell of that, etc.

>Sincerely,
>Bridgit Kuenning-Pollpeter, editor, Slate & Style
>Read my blog at:
>http://blogs.livewellnebraska.com/author/bpollpeter/

>"If we discover a desire within us that nothing in this world can
>satisfy, we should begin to wonder if perhaps we were created for
>another world."
>C.  S.  Lewis

>Message: 15
>Date: Sun, 10 Feb 2013 17:58:43 -0500
>From: Anita Ogletree <yrstrli at gmail.com
>To: Writer's Division Mailing List <stylist at nfbnet.org
>Subject: Re: [stylist] To ponder- taken to another level
>Message-ID: <5118262e.04a53a0a.6513.ffffb077 at mx.google.com
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1; format=flowed

>Bridgit,
>Yes, when I am going places like my doctor's office and I am
>familiar with the layout, I use so cane.  But there are times
>when I may be moving through my own house and I generally know
>where everything is in each room; however, there is the chance
>that if a little one has moved a chair that I might bump into it.
>Or those times when someone gets up from the table and doesn't
>push their chair all the way under it.  There was this coffee
>table in my mom's house that was made of a sturdz wood that was
>heavy.  I knew exactly where the table was in the living room and
>I deliberately try to walk around it.  But somehow my shin would
>make contact with the corner of that table.
>And I truly think that because I have light perception and can
>see objects that sometimes I become a little disoriented.  I have
>tried explaining this to other people and no one seems to really
>understand.  The lighting in the room and perhaps the shadows
>from the furniture or something seems to come together and I can
>end up veering too far left or right instead of walking straight.
>That happens especially when I am traveling outside or in wide
>open spaces like a large room.  I don't know.  It's kinda whacky.

>Anita


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