About Me

See what it looks like through my eyes by clicking here

I created this website to help those with visual impairments (especially students) to overcome and adapt to the challenges that come along with their disabilities. After years of desperately searching for help myself, I decided to create an informative, simple, and easily accessible resource guide for others, that offers tips, advice, helpful information, and connections to other related sites.

    Currently I am 18 years old, a senior in high school, and living in Massachusetts. I have been visually impaired since birth and it wasn’t fully discovered until I was about four years old. My parents noticed that I wasn’t able to recognize people and objects from farther than ten or fifteen feet away. After several trips to the optometrist, I was diagnosed with strabismic amblyopia in the right eye, refractive amblyopia in both eyes, estropia, and nearsightedness. People with mild myopia sometimes receive a prescription of about -1 or -2, but mine was between -7 and -8. Even though I had this level of impairment at such an early age, I don’t really remember it being a huge problem for me – mostly because when I was that age I spent a majority of my time playing up close with blocks, erector sets, and coloring. I didn’t understand at the time that the world wasn’t supposed to look that way to me, so I never really noticed until I got my first pair of glasses. I can remember the first time I put them on and seeing the world around me in a completely different way. In an instant, my family was more than curvy blobs, and the scenery of streets, houses, signs, and landscapes took on a whole new meaning to me. I was speechless and in awe.

         As I got older, I began to discover my strengths and weaknesses related to my eyesight. Sports, was one of my greatest weaknesses and remains so. I was never able to catch a flying football or baseball, but basketball and backyard soccer was fairly easy for me for at least a few years. I remember I wanted to quit my local school-based youth floor hockey team because my other teammates would sometimes get mad at me for making them lose a goal because I would stop to try and regain sight of the puck. I ended up quitting, but that helped me learn that there were just some things I couldn’t do, at least I can say that I tried.

          Even though I was not able to participate in sports, I discovered I have an excellent ear for music. I started my interest in music by watching hours of music videos on Vh1 and thought how cool it must be to play an instrument and be famous. I first picked up the guitar when I was seven and my talent became obvious very quickly. I would spend all day if I could, playing the guitar and teaching myself through experimentation and practice. My mom realized I was serious about this and signed me up for lessons. It wasn’t just the guitar I was good at; I could also play an electronic keyboard and the drums. Once, as we were driving in the car, a song was playing on the radio, I liked it and listened intently. When we arrived home, I ran to my keyboard and proceeded to play out some of the melody from memory. I seldom play instruments anymore, mostly due to the fact that my interests always fluctuate, but I haven’t lost any of my ability to do so, and hope to start again some time in the future. As time went on, I went through phases of interests: such as skateboarding, BMX biking, and roller-blades, but as my sight diminished, so did my ability to see the ground clearly ahead of me, so these activities slowly waned.

         Shortly after, I became increasingly interested in technology, especially computers. I was exposed to the internet and some creative applications by my Mom, who worked with all sorts of computer media and designed websites as a hobby. Today, I possess a passionate interest in graphic arts and photography, because I realized that I could utilize these devices to help me. I chose a DSLR camera with a large-mirror viewfinder, which I can see through nearly perfect. This not only enables me to use my camera like a picture-taking monocular, but using a traditional viewfinder is so much easier to use than an LCD display because you can see your subject even in direct sunlight. Once on the computer, I can enlarge and even zoom into the individual pixels of my photos to fix blemishes on people’s faces or even manipulate colors, backgrounds and so much more. I can do the same thing when I draw on the computer as well, so the computer really helps broaden my abilities, and it is interesting, challenging and so much fun! The pictures, buttons and banner on this website were all taken or created by me using my camera and various creative programs like Photoshop. I know pursuing this field is unusual for someone with poor eyesight, but I think it proves that there are always ways to adapt and do things that seem impossible.

My most recent drop in visual acuity occurred over the span of these past few years, especially last year, when I was diagnosed with red-green deficiency and myopic macular degeneration. My prescription is much stronger than years ago when I was younger and my prognosis is poor and it is expected that my vision will only degenerate further, to the point of legal blindness, only time will tell – so I am going to do all I can, while I can.

Thinking back, my poor eyesight presented a challenge for me when I re-entered public school  (in eighth grade) after being home-schooled since the first grade. When I was home schooled I could make my own accommodations without realizing I was, such as reading with the book closer and closer to my face and taking more time to read and finish my work. However, once I got into public school again, I was faced with timed tests and having trouble finishing them, reading aloud so slowly it sounded like a third-grade student reading instead of eighth grade, trying to copy notes off a whiteboard that were invisible to me due to my red/green deficiency, and getting laughed at in gym class because I was “the blind kid” who could never see the ball. This sounds dramatic, and it was, because it all hit me at once and I wasn’t ready for it. So, I just endured and I spent up until tenth grade doing all my work the same way everyone else did – in other words, I rarely got large print, and rarely received written notes of what was on the board, with the exception of a few generous and understanding teachers who helped me. I spent my entire afternoon and evening trying to finish my homework because it took hours to read my textbooks, looking at tiny Math equations, or in English, Science, or History slowly skimming and scanning to find the answers or read chapters. Thankfully, most of that came to an end in my junior year when I started to speak up about my situation. At first there were a lot of conflicts, but as time went on, I got lots of help, including a TVI (teacher of the visually impaired), a mobility specialist, a Mac Powerbook, a 504 plan, and most importantly, the understanding of my teachers. With my new accommodations, I get extended time and large type on tests including standardized ones and some assignments if necessary. If available, my textbooks are to be in either digital, large print, or audio formats, and notes and handouts can be scanned in as PDFs to be viewable on the computer, and some teachers provide a copy of Powerpoint presentations for my computer. There is much more to my plan, but these are the things that help me the most. I also own a CCTV, a hand held video magnifier, a 7x30 telescope, a 3x telescope, a 10x monocular telescope, and a Canon scanner.

Now that the rough edges have been smoothed out, things at school have been working out quite well. I have a whole lot more respect from my peers, many more friends, and a lot more understanding for others who have challenges of their own. If I’ve learned anything from this, it is that the more work you put in, the more satisfying the reward. Speak up, and never give up.