I'd be here all week if I recounted my experiences
... being a blind bint with a blind bugger partner.

Taxi drivers who believe we are too stupid to know the difference between our own "human" food and the dog's food. And those who, despite it being against the law and them knowing it, charge us extra when we travel with my fiance's guide dog - absolutely not allowed, fuckwits - its called "discrimination" according to the DDA, and don't think we don't know about it even if you don't admit it (you'd be surprised at the amount who do admit it in a righteous tone of voice however) - happy to shop you to the local council licensing department and see you lose your job.

My step mother asking my dad if, upon meeting my fiance for the first time, she would have to "take him to the toilet". Whilst I get the idea that being blind, we might need showing where the loo is in a more specific manner than a sighted person does, nobody has had to take either me or the s.o. "to the toilet" since we were very small children, ta - and in which case, I know where the bog is in that house - why wouldn't I show him if he wanted to know ? The mind boggles.

My mum wondering aloud to the assembled throng at our engagement party how on earth my fiance could know that he loved me "when he can't see you at all ?" She just can't get the idea that lack of eyesight is just that - it doesn't mean you have lack of anything else, including the ability to love someone. His mum was very restrained in not giving her a massive mouthful, I thought.

Countless people who on a daily basis assume that "blind" equates to "brain dead and must be spoken to and treated as if a child."

Honestly, I could go on but I'd be here all week. Which would be very boring.
(womanwhocanonlylivewithdogs, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:13, 17 replies)

May i ask
when you shop a cabbie, how do you know what his license number is?
( 100% Cock Raw like carrots., Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:21, closed)

Cabbie shopping...
We don't know what the license number is unless we ask (and they usually won't give because they know something is up, then). We don't TELL them that we're going to shop them (that would be somewhat dim), we get a receipt for the journey along with the same journey from the same firm without guide dog as a "control". If it's different, bingo. And obviously cab companies know who did what job when from their own records, which they have to give up if asked by the licensing bods.
We were contracted by the local council as mystery shoppers a coupla years back - the licensing office had had many complaints from guide dog owners in town and wanted to ferret the guilty ones out officially. We went through the local cab firms like a dose of salts. Ho hum.
(womanwhocanonlylivewithdogs, Sat 3 Apr 2010, 11:14, closed)

*sticks out tongue and pulls funny face*
( girlinthehole, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:22, closed)

She's blind apparently
she can't read your reply
( Bazongaloid, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:26, closed)

Prepare yourself for some ignorance. Ok, ready? Here we go.
Are you totally blind or partially sighted?
If the former, how do you browse B3ta? Is it with some likely-to-become-annoying text-to-voice thing or what?

I've no close blind aquaintances to ask and it's just occurred to me I have no idea how such things are dealt with.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:26, closed)

Her guide dog reads to her.

( girlinthehole, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:27, closed)

I think this is highly suspect
What happens if the dog encounters a passage it has some sort of objection to?
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:28, closed)

It just makes something up
That's why she never reads anything good about korean people, her dog is a terrible racist.
( Bazongaloid, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:30, closed)

If there was a television show based on the concept of a blind detective with a racist guide dog
I'd watch it EVERY WEEK WITHOUT FAIL.
( Mockingbird Practitioner of SCIENCE, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:32, closed)

This is possibly the best TV show concept I've ever heard in my life

( Bazongaloid, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:33, closed)

RUFF RUFF RUFF RUFF RUFF

( Bazongaloid, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:29, closed)

I don't know if it is the case here
But i have seen people using Braille computers.
( 100% Cock Raw like carrots., Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:32, closed)

So they have to stroke the keyboard and then stroke teh screen to make sure they didn't make a typo?

( Bazongaloid, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:33, closed)

Not sure
I have only seen someone "reading" one. They run their finger across one line at a time, and then press something that brings the next line up.
( 100% Cock Raw like carrots., Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:45, closed)

it'd be a bugger if you dropped crumbs on it

( Mighty Nibus who dares gins | @nibus, Thu 1 Apr 2010, 15:47, closed)

AND.
THEN.THERE.ARE.THE.PEOPLE.WHO.ASSUME.YOU.HAVE.A.HEARING.PROBLEM.AS.WELL.

*remembers holidays abroad with parents*
(Sadarse works like Mist condensing mud flaps, Fri 2 Apr 2010, 0:50, closed)

Hey, ignorance is fine, Mockingbird -
If someone really wants to know this shit I have no problem answering questions. Prejudice and flat line ignorance that couldn't even conceive that there might be solutions to get around the eyesight problem is what makes me feel sorry for people, that's the sad bit.

Look up "screen reader" on the interwebs if you're really interested on how the blind folks do computers. In my case, VoiceOver on the mac. It is a speaky text to speech thing, yeah. It's annoying only when you aren't used to it.
To answer your other question - I have no sight in my left eye and only some spotty peripheral in the right, about three percent I suppose of what would be "normal", difficult to say. I have what is termed as under 3/60 vision - i.e. I have to be closer than three feet to something to see it than a normally sighted person could see at sixty feet. Under that "line" there is no real diagnostic tool to figure out how bad it is, it's all seen medically as pretty much the same, until you get to "no light perception" (i.e. totally black out blind, which is what my fiance is).
In my case, I have to be about six inches away from an object about the size of your hand to actually notice it, but I still can't see the object clearly. Anything smaller is pretty much invisible. When I get my eyes tested (happens alot, oddly enough) they do it by waving their hands in front of my face at the distance of about six inches to see if I can tell what they're doing, which seems to be a medically recognised method, lol. I grew up with normal sight, lost the big chunk of it in my early twenties.

"Partially sighted" is a term not used much anymore (except by people who don't have experience of the same ;) ), due to it being so vague as to be useless. Someone who you might consider "partially sighted" (i.e. not black out blind) can need exactly the same assistive shit as someone totally blind, if their vision is very very poor. The current in vogue terms seem to be "sight impaired" (meaning the old "partially sighted") and "severely sight impaired" (which means anything from totally blind to my sort of eyesight to anything in between and somewhat better). Everyone is different, t'is the thing. Whatever the fuck it's called makes no odds to me - I have given up trying to explain my "percentage" of left over vision to all but those who are genuinely interested (as you seem to be.)

So, there you go.
(womanwhocanonlylivewithdogs, Sat 3 Apr 2010, 11:07, closed)