Blind and Visually Impaired Community
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Retirement Gift Idea for a Visually Impaired Colleague (self.Blind)
submitted by tidderfoedistuoefil
I have a dear 64M colleague who is retiring and is very visually impaired. (I believe he’s down to about 5% vision on his way to 0%.) We are having a retirement dinner party for him and are struggling with a good and meaningful retirement gift. Any ideas? I asked over in r/GiftIdeas and someone suggested I ask here! Thanks in advance!
Some things that may be helpful to know: He is not very physically active. He has no remaining family nor offspring. Rideshare is hardly a thing where we are so any mobility is dependent on friends. He is in an assisted living community.
EDIT to add that budget is very flexible- I’d say up to $1,000
UPDATE: We went with an Audible subscription, and also gifted him a handful of titles the readers of the office chose. Thank you guys so much!
Some things that may be helpful to know: He is not very physically active. He has no remaining family nor offspring. Rideshare is hardly a thing where we are so any mobility is dependent on friends. He is in an assisted living community.
EDIT to add that budget is very flexible- I’d say up to $1,000
UPDATE: We went with an Audible subscription, and also gifted him a handful of titles the readers of the office chose. Thank you guys so much!
GTbuddha 9 points 1y ago
One of the coolest things could be a once a month dinner outing. Someone picks him up and takes him to dinner and brings him home. Then others can join or not. It gives him something to look forward to each month.
Otherwise Audible is great!
Otherwise Audible is great!
tidderfoedistuoefil [OP] 8 points 1y ago
Thanks for this! We do have this arranged already such that he gets lunch with me or my coworkers at least once a week :).
TwoSunsRise 1 points 1y ago
That's awesome, thanks for doing that for him 💜
carolineecouture 8 points 1y ago
So a couple of things come to mind.
1. A gas gift card so they could reimburse friends for gas or share the cost of gas.
2. A grocery store card for food shopping if he's allowed his own snacks or meals.
3. Gift cards for favorite restaurants so he can treat his friends and himself.
4. If they have access to wifi a smart speaker like an Echo. (Check with the facility about this.)
5. Purchase a nice "easy chair" or something.
If you are purchasing gift cards please be careful of the scam where gift cards are drained on purchase and only get get cards direct from the retailer or make sure they haven't been tampered with.
Good luck!
1. A gas gift card so they could reimburse friends for gas or share the cost of gas.
2. A grocery store card for food shopping if he's allowed his own snacks or meals.
3. Gift cards for favorite restaurants so he can treat his friends and himself.
4. If they have access to wifi a smart speaker like an Echo. (Check with the facility about this.)
5. Purchase a nice "easy chair" or something.
If you are purchasing gift cards please be careful of the scam where gift cards are drained on purchase and only get get cards direct from the retailer or make sure they haven't been tampered with.
Good luck!
nighthawk_0730 3 points 1y ago
Does he need any accessibility devices? Sometimes insurance doesn't cover things that would be really helpful. I would ask him if there are any accessibility devices that would really change his life.
Anxious_Tune55 3 points 1y ago
Maybe an Audible subscription and a nice audio player? This player supports all kinds of digital books, both human-read ones like from Audible but also text to speech ebooks (DAISY or other accessible formats). https://store.humanware.com/hus/victor-reader-stream-2.html
LilacRose32 2 points 1y ago
A nice tactile watch? Or even a smartwatch
niamhweking 2 points 1y ago
I would suggest an audible subscription, a Google nest, or alexa. The restaurant vouchers and easy chair ideas another poster mentioned are great, the restaurant vouchers allow him to treat himself and the friends he uses for transport, and in his retirement keeps him active and social
TechnicalPragmatist 1 points 1y ago
What about a white cane, so if he does choose to use it he can.
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