Blind and Visually Impaired Community
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My grandmother is becoming blind (self.Blind)
submitted by l_eihpos
Hi everyone,
My grandmother is blinder and blinder everyday, and her doctor told her she will soon completely lose sight. She's quite upset about it. She's 82, but she's a very active person, playing scrabble, hiking, taking gymnastics classes.
My main two questions are:
-How can I reassure her, cheer her up?
-Do you have any activities that she could do to keep herself busy? I thought about listening to radio or podcasts, but another ideas are welcome!
Thank you everyone !
My grandmother is blinder and blinder everyday, and her doctor told her she will soon completely lose sight. She's quite upset about it. She's 82, but she's a very active person, playing scrabble, hiking, taking gymnastics classes.
My main two questions are:
-How can I reassure her, cheer her up?
-Do you have any activities that she could do to keep herself busy? I thought about listening to radio or podcasts, but another ideas are welcome!
Thank you everyone !
ravenmxc 2 points 6y ago
Don't know of anything for scrabble, but if she likes card games, you can look into getting her a deck of low vision playing cards. They're the same size as a regular deck, but the symbols and designs are enlarged to help people with poor vision.
BlindGuyNW 2 points 6y ago
There's Braille scrabble sets with raised letters in addition to the Braille dot patterns. I presume they're larger than the average. A quick Google search could turn up several places to get this kind of thing :)
l_eihpos [OP] 1 points 6y ago
Thank you, I'll have a look!
enjoyoutdoors 2 points 6y ago
The simple truth is that you should try to make it possible for her to do what she has always been doing.
She likes hiking. So she should hike. In company of someone who is good at picking scenery that attracts the senses she has left. She is getting less visual input but you can still do the wind-ruffling-hair thing, carefully pass blossoming bushes at the right time of the year or listen to a waterfall. (Which is three examples I could think of on the top of my head.) in fact, if her vision (and age) makes a longer hike harder you can for the spirit of things dress for a hike and go to a park. Chances are that she, with fondness of hikes, never bothered with the parks of her own city. The rangers can probably tell you all about the best route to ensure that you pass those blossoms I mentioned earlier.
The reality is that it will not be as it was before, but it can still be well worth the trouble. The trick is to figure out what makes it worth the trouble.
She likes hiking. So she should hike. In company of someone who is good at picking scenery that attracts the senses she has left. She is getting less visual input but you can still do the wind-ruffling-hair thing, carefully pass blossoming bushes at the right time of the year or listen to a waterfall. (Which is three examples I could think of on the top of my head.) in fact, if her vision (and age) makes a longer hike harder you can for the spirit of things dress for a hike and go to a park. Chances are that she, with fondness of hikes, never bothered with the parks of her own city. The rangers can probably tell you all about the best route to ensure that you pass those blossoms I mentioned earlier.
The reality is that it will not be as it was before, but it can still be well worth the trouble. The trick is to figure out what makes it worth the trouble.
l_eihpos [OP] 1 points 6y ago
Thank you for your reply. I agree with it, and my grandfather or other members of the family or her friends are already doing a lot for that.
But she also has always been independent, and I feel like she is having a hard time thinking that now she will always depend on people to do things.
That's why I was trying to find ideas of maybe new activities she could do by herself when no one is available to help her or when she just wants to be by herself.
But she also has always been independent, and I feel like she is having a hard time thinking that now she will always depend on people to do things.
That's why I was trying to find ideas of maybe new activities she could do by herself when no one is available to help her or when she just wants to be by herself.
slightlyoffki 1 points 6y ago
It depends upon the etiology of her blindness. Does she have macular degeneration?
l_eihpos [OP] 1 points 6y ago
I am not sure. She started by losing her peripheral vision, and her field of vision is getting smaller and smaller, until complete blindness.
slightlyoffki 1 points 6y ago
That sounds like glaucoma. Sadly, there is not much they can do for that if it's already that far gone, but again, depending on what the cause is, she can probably see a low vision specialist who can provide her with some tools and teach her some tricks for managing her life with limited vision.
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