A dear friend and our faithful Blogget Vicki has asked me to
write about being independent and suddenly finding yourself relying on others. When I went blind, I didn’t have anyone I could
ask for help, my parents died very soon after I lost my sight, so I can only
speak from when I realised, I needed help but what it felt like not to get it.
There are a lot of days even now when my Husband and I feel
totally useless. When we want to do the simplest of things to some, but to us
it’s impossible or, not worth the stress and pain of doing whatever, so we just
don’t bother this leaves us feeling like failures.
Most things Hub and I manage really well and we do a
blooming good job. Some of my sighted friends say we do better than what they
do and I have to agree. But when it comes to things like painting and
decorating, or building fixing something, then we really do rely on others but
just get let down all the time by people. If family can’t or won’t help, we
just stop asking or we are too ashamed to ask in the first place. Personally, when
my Mum was alive, I just knew what she wanted and I did it with little fuss. Her
health was never good. She suffered with breathing/Emphysema had a bad heart
and was a diabetic. Sadly, she didn’t do anything to help her and this made it
worse for me because she lived to help me with trying to find treatment for my
eyesight, but I couldn’t help her to be healthier.
I bet there were days when she too felt hopeless. When she
wanted to do something but couldn’t. she never asked me for help, so what I did
for her was what I felt she needed, but what about what she wanted? What she
would like? I seemed to do the basics for her like pick up some shopping, do
her ironing and wash her bathroom. I used to wash her doors inside her house
down all the time as I could see the yellow from her dreadful cancer sticks. I would
stand at the kitchen sink pealing vegetables for her as her back hurt her when
she stood. She had a condition with her back too remember she was forty years
older than me.
I’m sure I didn’t iron her clothes in the way she liked,
everyone has their own way, don’t they? I’m positive I missed a bit or over did
some parts of her cleaning. What I failed to do was take her places, I wish I had,
but life for me back then was a challenge. My ex was good he did take her out a
couple of times a year, but the rest of the time, he worked and I was partially
sighted, never have been able to drive.
I guess to always have been able to do something, and to
have that removed, is so painful.
When I went blind, I couldn’t do the simplest of things like
tell the time. How could I see the clock? Reading letters was impossible. Seeing
who was at my door was too much to cope with at the time. It was really scary
and still today, I know of a lot of blind people who don’t like to answer the
door.
Sorting out washing, whites from darks. How do you do that
if you are blind? Remember I lost my sight twenty years ago so there wasn’t the
technology then what there is now and even now, it can be so frustrating.
When I am doing my washing, I just have to have a very good
memory. Try to remember exactly what colour things are from when I was told
when I bought them. Luckily our Son does his own washing now, but obviously
when he was a child, I did it all.
When we last moved house, my Husband was abroad so packing
our stuff was a challenge. It didn’t help the fact I didn’t want to move
either. My brother in law was brilliant on the day we moved, he came to help
us. But leading up to that day was so hard. And when we got to our last house,
gosh it was so hard to unpack everything. It took weeks. We did label our boxes
in print and Braille. But I was pretty stuffed not being able to see and my
Braille skills are poor. But we got
there. We also got our Son into a great school. Took him there and Hub walked
him to get him used to where to go so it wasn’t daunting for him on his first day.
Of course, Hub didn’t have a clue how to get there, so we relied on our Son, it
was more like supporting him to show that he could actually do it on his own. To
be with someone we hoped would be better than doing it alone. Thank God on day
one of our Son going to his new school, he made some great friends. He was not
a small child, he was just turned fifteen, the days when he was very young,
when I battled to get him to school and back every day are in other blogs.
Again, I didn’t have help getting my Son to school. Every day
I had to face the dreaded walk hoping to God I could find my way there and
worse back. As on the way back home, I was alone and I used to be ill the night
before thinking if I had got lost on the way home, how would I get back to
school to pick him up later on?
But I learned the white cane then got a guide dog, so I relied
on my dog. To learn to put your trust in a dog took a long time. And once you
do, you learn just how important dogs are.
When my Son was a small child, he had extra responsibility
at school. When it came to parent days other people would look at their child’s
books what work they had done, my poor Son had to talk me through everything. When
he was tiny as in four, he used to get my finger and put it on his drawings. When
I asked him why did he do this, he replied. “Mummy that is how you see!”” my
heart broke, he actually thought I could see with my fingers. He shouldn’t have
had that pressure of showing me his books. The teachers could have been more compassionate,
but fact is they weren’t and from friends who still have children at school, a
lot of them still go through hell sadly.
There are days when I would love to just get in a car and go
out, but obviously I can’t. When Hub is away on business, he has to rely on
people as he is often in different places, but he copes. Though it is stressful
but not half as stressful to what it used to be when he was really on his own
when he worked abroad.
I wish right now I could go to the bedroom and paint it. Three
long weeks I have been waiting for it to be done. But I can’t. I would make a
mess. Though if I had the tools, I think I would be giving it a go right now.
I know I need to paint my wooden fence, but I shall wait
again for a gardener to do it. And then, wonder, what kind of job he has done. You
should see the mess of my wood what the last painter did? It’s all pealing off. I’m going to have to
get it all done again. Again, if only I could do it. But gloss is not easy.
I know of a lady who has MS. She really is ill. She used to
be a nurse, caring for others. Now she can’t even get herself dressed. Someone comes
in to her each day and washes and dresses her. Cooks for her too. Someone else
takes her shopping. I was so very sad to learn that she dropped something and
her family, son and daughter, mocked her telling her not to be so pathetic and
bend over to get it. How cruel they were to her leaving her to be broken
hearted that her so called loved ones did that to her. So, it’s not only
needing help but it’s the uncaring families who really can break us.
This same poor lady knows that her husband is seeing other women
because she can’t be as intimate with her Husband as she used to be. He actually
speaks to them on the phone in front of her. Total disregards for this lady. She
is human and she has feelings. She can’t express herself as she used to but she
is the same person.
People can lose their dignity. Their lifestyle. Their friends
and family. It’s not just all about cooking or cleaning, dressing washing,
taking us shopping, its words said by others. Why do people do this?
I know of someone who is deaf and she feels so left out when
she goes to where there are a few people gathering. Friends of hers. She can’t
join in with the conversation any longer and feels very left out. So, she can
drive, and do all the things that some people can’t, but still she would love
to be a part of her friends’ conversation. Or eves drop on her kids. Listen out
for people coming to the door or out side of her house when they shouldn’t be
as she lives in the middle of the countryside, far from anyone.
And this is another thing, when you can’t see if like me
your Husband/Wife/partner is also blind, then you don’t have a choice where to
live as you would if you could see. You have to live close to where you can get
out and find.
I feel for those people who can’t get out of the house. Who have
no help or family who can help them? Somewhere right now there is someone, not
too far from you, you may even be this person, who is so alone. Who wishes just
to get out even for half an hour? Who just wants to be able to chat to another human?
But they are prisoners to their disability. To their fears. To the cruel life
that has been given to them. Not everyone is strong and not everyone wants to
be strong. Some people don’t want to be told they can do it but be told they
can do it with help but to get help to be chained to someone all the time too is
very sad. When we are young and free, we don’t expect at some part of our lives
to be relying on others. I have friends who pay loads of money to get what they
need. But again, is it what they want? And to have to hand over money to
someone for doing something that would take a family member or friend half an
hour to do, must be awful.
As a society now we are turning into a very hard and
uncaring race. We care about ourselves far too much. We have no regards for
others. If everyone who went to church was to help one person a week, what a massive
difference that would make to someone’s life. if everyone who worked rather
than do as many hours overtime, just gave up one hour per week to someone who
really would appreciate you, it would be better for you than any amount of
money could give you with working overtime. And it would mean more to hit person
you are helping than ten years of money earned with overtime.
You may think your Mum or Dad is a Burdon. Your uncle or
friend, well stop and think just how do they feel? Did they ask to be in this situation,
and one day, it could be you. Your perfect world may come crashing down, as did
theirs, only they know now just how it feels to need someone and moreover, to
need someone who isn’t there!
© Fiona Cummings
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