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Connect and support others through their hardships, discoveries and stories about vision loss.
Our community wall is nothing without people like you and the others who have words of wisdom to share. Use the search bar to find certain articles based off of their content, or use our filters to sort posts by contributor type.
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Catch our newest contributors with their unique journies. We all start somewhere!
Educator
Hi all, my name is Ted Tahquechi and I'm almost totally blind. I worked in the videogame industry for a million years before a car accident left me with 5% low functioning vision in one and nothing in the other. I worked for Atari, Accolade and Mattel Toys and probably made some games you or someone in your family know, just google me lol. After the accident, I went back to school and finished degrees in fine art photography and studio art photography. My work can be seen at www.tahquechi.com if you are interested. I have a guide dog, she is a black lab and her name is Fauna. We do a lot of traveling (when we aren't locked down from this virus) and document our wanderings at www.blindtravels.com which is my website with destination reviews and travel tips for the blind and visually impaired. It took me quite a few years after losing my sight to get back on track. I was very stubborn and refused to use my cane literally stumbling through life. I used a cane for 18 years and my wife finally convinced (maybe ordered?) me to apply for a guide dog. She has changed my life and made me so much more independent than I could have ever imagined. I'd love to hear some of your stories and hope you take the time to introduce yourself!
Pupil
I was an avid trader before my vision got too bad. At first I gave up on reading. Then I started taking books under a CCTV. Then that proved to taxing so I switched to audiobooks. Its been nice. Buti was sitting here listening to a book and all of a sudden it hit me. I wanted to burst into tears but I’m not alone so I didn’t. I miss books. Carrying them in my purse, pulling them out when I was bored or needed to escape. I miss dog earing my favorite parts and making bookmarks on index cards for each book I read. I miss seeing my progress as I turned the pages and keeping a book light clipped to my headboard for nights of endless reading. I miss it so much.... I just needed to share it with someone. Thanks.
Newcomer
My kid and I ran into some of the ads and found this site. I did not know what I was planning to run into. Showed my son this site. I did not know what I was planning to run into. Showed my son this site’s alphabet, which he really liked. The sounds were so interesting to listen to and I even showed this to my wife. It’s really helping my kid understand and learn the alphabet in a fun way. He keeps repeating the sounds and I go along with it as well. It feels like we’re connecting in another way.He has some troubles with his sight, but I really want to prep my kid to go far. Is anyone else a parent here who wants to help his kid learn?
Newcomer
There are actually a lot of online multiplayer games to play during the quarantine! QuentinC’s Playroom was made specifically for visually impaired people and supports different languages. Works on Windows and Mac, easy to set up and play, and is entirely audio-based, no GUI at all. Highly recommend that due to the amount of games, plus they have UNO!”
Newcomer
Audio Vault has so many of my favorite films to listen to. Sometimes there are no captions for a film I want to experience so this site is a lifesaver. You can go to it here! http://www.audiovault.net/ I’m always looking for new suggestions. Some of my favorite movies are Knives Out, 101 Dalmatians, 21 Jump Street, and Wild Child.
Pupil
I had less than 1% chance of survival – miraculously I’m here today but legally blind. A perfect June evening turned
turned into a nightmare! An aneurysm burst in my brain causing me to fall. I suffered a TBI, should never have made it, but after 2 months in ICU and rehab, came home, legally blind and began putting my life back together again. It has been vital for my wife and I to take a walk in nature daily. I also work out every day as I lost 40 lbs and all my strength. Now I’m feeling stronger, but still suffer from frequent frustration like when I can’t see or break something, or things don’t work out as I expected. Rest has been helpful. Does anyone have helpful input for dealing with frustration?
Newcomer
I am a totally blind college student who’s had several programming internships so my answer will be based on these. I use windows xp as my operating system and Jaws to read what appears on the screen to me in synthetic speech. For java programming I use eclipse, since it’s a fully featured IDE that is accessible. In my experience as a general rule java programs that use SWT as the GUI toolkit are more accessible then programs that use Swing which is why I stay away from netbeans. For any .net programming I use visual studio 2005 since it was the standard version used at my internship and is very accessible using Jaws and a set of scripts that were developed to make things such as the form designer more accessible. For C and C++ programming I use cygwin (spelled c y g w i n ) with g c c as my compiler and emacs or vim as my editor depending on what I need to do. A lot of my internship involved programming for Z/OS. I used an r login session through C y g w i n to access the U S S subsystem on the mainframe and C 3 2 7 0 as my 3270 emulator to access the ISPF portion of the mainframe. I usually rely on synthetic speech but do have a Braille display. I find I usually work faster with speech but use the Braille display in situations where punctuation matters and gets complicated. Examples of this are if statements with lots of nested parenthesis’s and JCL where punctuation is incredibly important.”
Educator
To be honest, establishing a layout was good for me, as well as 'touch' items to keep me oriented (a section of texture on the wall, different for each part of progress. Velcro, terrycloth, etc.). I also count my steps and move that way until it is habit. It's not perfect. Today I moved my trash can to pick up items around it. Smoke alarm went off, I moved to silence it, and went head over man boobs as I hit the can. Broke the trashcan and maybe some knuckles on the wall on the way down. I switched most of what I own to plastic. I was a bit clumsy to begin with and going blind did not help. Now if I drop a dish, it usually survives. The main thing, though? Positive mind set. I accept my blindness as my new reality, but I do not let it destroy my peace. Forgiving yourself when you make a mistake is a big part of that. Letting go of the embarrassment when you mess up is another. Faith is another. Not religion, mind you, but faith. I have faith that when I walk forward, I will be okay. I have faith that my life is not over. I've even used it to help make some new initiatives in my life, like exercise, diet, new experiences... I was always afraid of messing up all my life. It's going to happen. But the best thing you can learn is to bounce back, accept things with grace, and don't give up.
Newcomer
Apps like Synaptic will completely change your android into an accessible phone for any V.I.P or just changing the home for any V.I.P or just changing the home launcher to one with more customizations can improve its accessibility. Using Noca launcher with custom icons for higher contrast helps too! Apps for everyday life include Seeing AI, Be my eyes and many 3rd party camera magnifiers.”
Educator
Safety and independence take some courage. You can do it. If a cane isn't your thing you can look into getting a guide dog. To get a guide dog, you'll need to have good O & M skills and the cane can give you that.“
Newcomer
I wasn’t really sure where to start with learning braille. Honestly, it seems really confusing with the dots and all. I looked through I looked through the resources for this site and realized that it actually isn’t that hard to learn. I think I was just being stubborn! What's your guy's journeys?
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