All blind people cannot see!
Actually the majority of blind people have some useful residual vision.

That other senses are automatically stronger. Sometimes, yes, but in my experience (as a VIP researcher of 10 years), it is the exception rather than the rule.

We're not all the same. Hell, we don't agree on anything! But like survivors of any other shared trauma we present a united front and defend each other when outsiders don't treat one of us with dignity and respect.

Going blind didn't make our hearing better, it just made our eyesight worse.

Most of the assumptions about us aren't just wrong, they're stoopid, too. Even smart people think stoopid things when it comes to blindness.

No, blindness hasn't given me extra wisdom. I wish!

I can't walk through a store without my cane but I can read my phone. That's just how my particular genetic disease manifests itself - adequate focus but a tiny field of vision and everything is darker than it used to be. I'm aware what using both a phone and a cane must seem like to people with stoopid misconceptions but I'm old enough not to care if they think I'm faking it.

Blindness isn't an ON or OFF switch. It's more nuanced than that. It's not even a spectrum. It's still more nuanced. It's more like half a dozen spectrums at once - light perception, acuity, focus, near vs. far, color discernment, clarity, contrast, and there are a whole bunch of things that can go wrong between the eyes and the brain which make it so we can't make sense of what our eyes are seeing. And even that explanation is too simple. Most blind people's blindness is unique in terms of how they experience vision, so when I say I'm blind I might mean something very different from someone else saying they're blind.

I don't want pity, but I don't want my blindness ignored, either. Don't act like my blindness is a tragedy because it's not - it's merely an inconvenience. But don't act like I'm not blind and expect me to be able to do everything I use to be able to do.

I don't know exactly where to draw the line, either, so you're forgiven if you don't get it right on the first try.

I don't think about being blind much. Mostly I'm thinking the same things you're thinking - I hope the girl behind the counter thinks I'm cute, I hope Ukraine kicks the Russian Army's ass, I hope they play some Cure and Depeche Mode at the club next time we go dancing, I hope there's some cookies left and my son didn't eat them all, I hope my favorite team gets their shit together and makes the playoffs this year. A human being without eyesight is still a human being.

I honestly have no idea how to act blind. This is new to me. I don't know any blind people in real life other than me, and I'm making it up as I go.

Going blind is an emotional roller coaster. Unexpected emotions dogpile on us. Sometimes we're angry, sometimes we're jealous, sometimes we feel we deserved this somehow, but most of the time we're grieving. We grieve the loss of our eyesight, the loss of our potential, the loss of our sense of purpose in life, even the loss of our identity. Going blind is hard.

Being blind is easy. No, really. Day to day life without vision is much easier than I imagined. Yes, I'm serious. It's even weirdly fun sometimes. Once I got over the grief it's been far better than I expected.

Not all blind people can read Braille. I can't, and I have no desire to learn. The internet and text to speech software has made Braille a lot less necessary than it was when I was a kid. Maybe the definition of literacy is changing because a blind person with a smart phone has access to much more literature than they would find in the world's biggest Braille library.

Blindness isn't my personality.

I hate it when people feel awkward around me. I never want to be the reason you feel uncomfortable. Go ahead and crack that funny blind joke, ask that stoopid question, chat with me about the weather or the Green Bay Packers or Pink Floyd or whether pineapple belongs on pizza or anything you'd say to me if I wasn't blind. Don't censor yourself because I'm blind. Just be yourself.

It's crazy how much I can get away with being blind. They never check my receipt at Wal-Mart even though it's far more likely I missed something in my shopping cart. If you ever want to live a life of crime, blindness deflects a lot of suspicion.

I'm squeaky clean. I've got kids and grandkids and I'm trying to set an example for them. The point about living a life of crime is not autobiographical. Don't read too much into it =)

Please come back to r/Blind and let us know how your story is going. I'd love a link to it when you're ready to share.

The ‘special ability’ trope. Sometimes it’s funny, but it’s also very cliché - just from a storytelling standpoint. Like ‘oh the blind character can’t see but somehow always wins at poker’ or something similar.
Others have mentioned this as well, but please note that blind / visually impaired people do not just see blackness or nothing. We can see to a certain degree but not much that leaves us with reliable vision.
Good luck!

Biggest piece of advice for writing a blind character is to pick a condition that causes blindness and use that, with all the variations of amount of vision and other symptoms that causes.

there's a couple things here.
1. not every blind person uses echo location.
2. if you're writing a fantasy book, your blind character does not have to be the milky eyed seer type.
3. blind people aren't dare devil. our senses are great, but they're not super enhanced.
4. no face touching! This is not a thing done by blind people. Not often, anyway.
5. sighted guide is a thing. If your blind character needs to be guided anywhere, it should not be done through hand holding.
6. please don't use terms like differently abled.
7. blind people watch and read things.
there's probably way more than I've listed here, but these should get you started.

Please don't have the blind character touch another person's face as a way of learning what that person looks like. It's just not a thing we do and it actually provides very little useful information.

Thank you for reaching out, that’s very appreciated!

Please don’t have them faking or using their blindness to scam people. I don’t think that’s a super common stereotype, but it does exist and it’s very harmful for obvious reasons.

Little late to the party but I will help.


Ultimately each of us is an individual. Each person has a different personality. Some are stubborn, some are mean, some are sweet, some are crybabies, some are grouchy, some are helpful, some are miserly, some are unkind, some are thieves, some are destined to be the next genius who will invent something cool. You get my point. Ultimately we are people who just don’t have limited senses some people have vision. Some like me totally lack a sense and can’t see a single thing. I am totally blind. But I have a personality and not devoid of it. We’re not all the same and not all a blind type. I have got in to typology and self reflection so I know some of that stuff quite well. And.

We all have diverse interest some more similar and some more different. And everyone likes their own things some go in to communities where there are not many blind people.

Some are hands on some are dreamers.

Write your character like a normal character but having to deal with blindness with their own individual personality and way, not the special type or the blind type or the blind sterotype. There is no such thing. The methods to do things can be more similar there’s only so many ways to adapt but you can still be creative. There’s standard ways to deal with blindness but that’s just learning to work with the world with no vision or some vision or little vision. It doesn’t obfuscate personality.

Some like me is very pull herself up by the boot straps represses feelings, don’t want much help thanks a lot, learns quickly, learnts by trial and error. And kind of stubborn. I am an estj in mbti if that means anything to you at all.

Let’s take ocean you know the big five, if we gave it all to these people everyone in the blind community you’ll find just as much diversity as you’d find in the nondisabled or communities of other disabilities.


Disability does not define the person it’s something they have to live with or cope with. And understand.

Some well and some can’t seem to cope with it different temperment and personality. As we say in more introspection of a different type.


Some will fall apart and love to depend on people, ask people for help, more attached to people, want more help and more support from friends and family. Like I said then you have me, who kind of don’t.


You have people who don’t want to work and stay on ssi all their lives and then you have workaholic me, going through school and this is probably my close to 30th hour awake. So we totally differ. I am not the type to stay home and get babyed and pampered.

I love reforms and have been serving and representing and volunteering. I am a 1 on the enneagram. Just an example you don’t need to be in to it, but you will find all 9 enneagram types in the blind community and all 16 jungian types and all sorts of combos on ocean and so forth.

I actually find my personality types a bit more interesting then blind stereotypes haha! I identify more as a person then as a blind anything. Some people will identify more with their disability and let it hinder and color them. Some won’t and are completely just out there. It all depends.

We’re just regular ole people just with defective vision.


Okay I think I belabored that enough.


So pick a condition as someone else said, choose her personality without thinking of blindness then apply that to how she would cope with her disability.


Don’t make her have super powers or be healed because then you just defeated the point of the blind character.


Also don’t make her play music, she could but not because she’s blind. Not every blind person is a musician or audiophile. Not every blind person drinks and has sex. Some people yes. Sure. They live a sexy life and they love boos remember real people own personalities.


don’t make her sit at home and don’t do anything and is a crippled blind people can go out and do a lot. I’ve traveled around my city quite a bit. Been around my county many times. Went yelping and food hunting, been to 6 different state in 2 weeks on the eastern seaboard of the Us. As a single blind woman with minimal help. I didn’t sit at home and mope or in my hotel room. I went out for pizza at 10 or 11 at night and was almost stranded in new york then figured out there was the path trains. I wnet to 3 or 4 sightes by myself found my way when I was on vacation a day. There was a few days I visited friends. But yeah. I planned my own trip and knew where I wanted to go.


So don’t have the character sit at home and mope unless you want her to hahaha! That’s not all blind people.


We won’t fall and we don’t need a seat all the time. We can be very mobile and independent.


We don’t need to be babyed well some do, and some prefer it, but it’s not everyone. So not everyone has their mommy or daddy or a sibling by their side. Or a guardian.

Yes we can walk down the street. Get ourselves dressed showered, and some people like make up and some don’t.



Okay I think I will stop now you get the point. And hopefully the end of this pointed out some stereotypes. There is limitations, but blind people can do what ever job they want to as well. Obviously not stuff strictly needing vision like pilot or bus driver or photographer. But they can and I’ve seen some in the medical field, some in public life and office etc…… but my point is make this a person first then how they would cope as a blind person, pick a possible eye condition and treat them just the same as any other characters. Some blind people are very submissive and soft spoken or your character could be a character or somewhere in the middle. All those types of blind people exist. It’s your choice just like most humans.

Have fun and it’ll be fun. Feel free to ask questions or stay in touch. I’ve been doing this for a long time talking to people about blindness.

I will leave this as a warning - Please follow the weekly post thread.

Only reason I am leaving this one is because you got correspondence before I saw this post.