Category: Growing Up with RP

Flying Balls Part 2: Totally Pucked

Please excuse the pun-intended, inappropriate title, and I apologize that the corresponding story is not as funny as the title!

I must admit that my sister’s post, Flying Balls and Other Memories, while completely funny and moving, brought up some baggage for me…. those nervous stomach-aches I would get as my 3rd grade class marched down to the gym for PE class.  I never knew what lay ahead for me and the anxiety this produced is probably similar to kids with dyslexia right before they are asked to read aloud– the impending doom of knowing without a doubt that you are about to be humiliated in front of other kids.  And so begins my 3rd grade hockey unit in PE.

Take a moment to imagine the risks involved for a child without peripheral vision playing hockey.  Getting hit with the puck, maybe?  Or with a hockey stick?  I had the privilege of being smacked with both, one after another, right in the nose.  (Parents of children with RP– take note– get your child excused from PE during hockey, or at least a face mask!)

Fortunately, since it was elementary school, the sticks and pucks must have been made of plastic, although they still hurt.  The impact was enough to pop a blood vessel in my nose that caused quite a gusher.  I remember Mr. Houk, our PE teacher, taking me straight to the nurse’s office.  But when we arrived, the nurse was not there, so he left to look for her, leaving me sitting in a chair pinching my hose to stop the bleeding.  It was bleeding so much, however, that pinching it with the one kleenex he had handed me in the gym just wasn’t enough.  The kleenex was soon soaked, so I just cupped my hands under my chin as blood pooled in my palms (apologies for the disgusting visual– kind of a necessary part of the story though).

Mr. Houk returned after several minutes, and I remember feeling relieved to see him, thinking that he would surely feel bad for me and help me.  But my relief soon turned to confusion as he yelled, “What are you doing?!”  He quickly grabbed a box of kleenex that was near me, though out of my line of vision, and shoved it on my lap.  “Why are you just sitting there? Use these!” he barked, clearly angry that I was making such a mess and that I hadn’t seen the kleenex.  Hot tears streamed down my small face as I realized what I should have seen.  I felt embarrassed and ashamed and remember thinking to myself, “Why am I so stupid?”

Like Jenelle said in her post on PE class, I can’t believe that something that happened 24 years ago still causes me to tear up as I write about it.  I guess it’s one of those memories that I just pushed to the back of my mind, hoping it would disappear (what are those called, Psych. majors, repressed memories?)

As soon as I thought about this incident after reading Jenelle’s post, I decided to bring it up in counseling to figure out how the heck I can forget about it for good.  My counselor, of course, pointed out that I can never “erase” my memory, but she advised me to sit down and write about the incident, recount the emotions, but then to think about the truth regarding the incident.

All these years I have been thinking, “I should have grabbed the kleenex.  I am so stupid!”  And those are probably reasonable thoughts for a 9-year-old to have.  But I’ve grown up, and I need to put a “grown up” filter on the situation in order to see the simple truth.  The truth, of course, is that the box of kleenex was not visible to me.  An adult teacher should not have expected me to see it on my own and should not have shown anger or irritation.  I was not inadequate or stupid.

The funny thing about counseling is that some of the things you end up realizing are completely simple and obvious to others but remain a blind spot to the one person who could benefit from the truth.  So visually impaired persons are definitely not the only ones with blind spots.

Unfortunately, when you start believing lies about yourself at a young age, they tend to start building on one another– and eventually they catch up to you.  If you consistently perceive that you are inadequate and stupid, for example, you begin to believe that’s who you are and sometimes even act that way.  So as adults, we need to do some major deconstruction to maintain a healthy view of ourselves.  It’s hard work, and I must admit that I still have a lot of work to do.

Even walking into my daughter’s elementary school brings up a fair amount of anxiety for me but has also motivated me to deconstruct more stories from my childhood to find the truth.  My goal is to unravel the lies I believed about myself– all the messages that said, “You’re stupid and inadequate” so that I can both be and feel like an adequate, intelligent adult who does not allow vision or perception to define who I am.

I have read several comments on our blog that say “RP doesn’t have to define you”, and it’s an expression I am familiar with– I even wrote it confidently in a college essay about RP.  While I think this statement is true, I also think it can be misconstrued.  For example, at times I have worked so hard to NOT let it define me that, in so doing, I accomplished the opposite. If you’re constantly trying to hide something, you oftentimes end up revealing it even more.

Perhaps you have something in your life that you try to keep hidden.  Perhaps something from your past that you constantly try to forget?  Consider trying the process I went through above with your own past.  Recall the incident and fully go there– emotions and all.  Then deconstruct it as an adult.  What really happened?  What is the truth?  I hope you will find, as I did, that the incident says a lot less about who you are than you thought it did.

Flying Balls & Other Memories

I am afraid of flying balls.  (please take a moment to snicker to yourself if necessary).  Ahem, for a person with limited peripheral vision flying objects of any sort can be dangerous.  But it seems flying balls have been the ones I’ve had to deal with most in my life.  I can recall being smacked in the face by one on several occassions.  And what better time is there to be smacked in the face with a flying ball than elementary school?! Continue reading “Flying Balls & Other Memories” →

Use Your Eyes

The shame and embarrassment of not being able to see like everybody else started at an early age.  I can remember going up to the chalkboard in first grade and not being able to find where the teacher had set the chalk.  The whole class was watching and waiting for me to write on the board, but I could not find the chalk.  My face burned with redness as I started moving my hand along the bottom of the chalkboard in hopes of being able to feel where the chalk was.  “Use your eyes, ” I heard my teacher saying in a stern voice, which only made me more apprehensive.  After fumbling around a bit, I located the chalk and began to write on the board as tears welled up in my eyes. I remember wishing that I could “use my eyes” like all the other kids, but I couldn’t.

I was diagnosed with RP at age 5, so my teacher was well aware of my vision challenges, but yet she still was not comfortable with me using my hands to find a small object (side note – she also mimicked kids who read slow by mockingly telling them “you are reading like a robot”, so perhaps teaching wasn’t her calling in life).  But as I’ve grown older, I still find that people are uneasy with me doing things a different way than they do.  It makes them uncomfortable to see me feel around for an object that they can spot within seconds, or to see me walking slow in unfamiliar terrain so that I don’t trip on something.  The funny thing is that I can do many of the same things that people with normal vision can, but I have to take a slower and often times more awkward-looking approach.

I wish that I could say that I am beyond the point of getting embarrased by my vision, but I still find my face turning red when I drop a coin at the store and can’t see where to pick it up, or when I walk into a dark restaurant and begin slowly shuffling like a turtle.  One of the biggest challenges about being partially-sighted is that it is not a term that most people understand.  They think you’re either blind or your not – there’s no in-between.  And because RP is so rare, it’s often difficult to explain why you don’t see like everyone else.  My friends and family are pretty used to the way I “use my eyes” differently than they do, but to the complete stranger standing behind me in the grocery line, I am the freak that can’t find a quarter right in front of her face.  Maybe that’s not what they’re thinking, but it sure feels like it from my perspective.  I know that I need to not care what strangers think, but this is my journey, and this is where I’m at right now.

The Narrow Tunnel of Compensation

I always felt I should possess some amazing talent to reconcile my missing rods and cones. Perhaps if I stood out as a musician, athlete, or scholar, I would not stand out for my lack of vision.

My parents took me to voice lessons with a nice, old nun in a dark, scary convent when I was eight. Yet “Go Tell It On The Mountain” practiced 50 times over did not improve my voice. I auditioned for the Young Naperville Singers in hopes of improving, but the director said she had heard kindergartners who could hold notes better than my third grade voice. That ended my hopes of becoming a female Stevie Wonder!  I also tried my luck at cross-country, a fabulous sport where there is no unforeseen ball to smack you in the face.  I was a good runner, but didn’t stand out as the one who won the races, and in my narrow vision of compensation I wanted to be that winner.

I think we’re taught this type of compensation in America. If you’re not right-brained, you better be left-brained: and if you’re not left brained, you sure as heck better be right. If you’re both, you’re blessed. If you’re neither, there’s something terribly wrong. If you’re lacking in looks, you better have a superbly gregarious personality. If you have no personality, you better at least be a genius. And on it goes.

I’ve come to learn that we should pay attention to our strengths, but we shouldn’t rely on them to block out our weaker areas. Our challenges will still be there, and we must deal with them. Our equation of wholeness is oftentimes flawed-a visual impairment is not a -50 and a great voice is not a +50. A visual impairment could be a +10 and a great voice a -25, depending on how they are used to shape and teach us and those around us.

“Normal”

Ever since I can remember, I’ve wanted to be “normal”.  I’ve wanted to just blend in and not make a spectacle of myself (which is pretty hard to do when you’re running into poles and such.) I’ve literally pictured what my life would look like if I was “normal”, and by normal, I of course mean perfectly-sighted.  I would live out in the country– or maybe I wouldn’t– but I’d at least have the choice to live in the boonies because the “normal me” could drive.  I’d have some job that required a lot of driving– like a pharmaceutical rep– or maybe I wouldn’t– but at least I’d be able to choose a career that involves driving.  I’d play beach volleyball– or maybe I wouldn’t– but at least it’d be an option on a hot, summer day.  You catch my drift;  “normal me” has a lot of options.The funny thing is that most of my “normal me” fantasies don’t envision my life all that different from what it is now– I’d still be married to the same amazing man, have the same sweet children, the same supportive friends, live in a similar house with a similar career path, but I’d be a much “better me”.  I’d look better (because I’d be able to do my makeup better if i could see it more clearly, of course!), act funnier and wittie (because I’d see funny things all around me), be a more-together and fun mom (wouldn’t lose a thing if I could see!), be more outgoing, athletic, involved…… I’d just be me with a little boost.Okay, so “normal me” is beginning to just sound like “perfect me”.  Definitely not saying I would be perfect, but I really can’t help but think I’d be BETTER.  I know that most people have their “thing” that makes them feel abnormal– the family they grew up in (probably half of America for that one), some physical trait that they don’t like about their face or body, some secret about their past, some act that they wish they hadn’t done or hadn’t been done to them…… there are probably very few people who would say they feel “normal”, whatever that word really even means.

But if so many people don’t fit into being “normal”, why do I sometimes feel like I am the only one who sticks out as “not normal”?  And if I really do enjoy most aspects of my life, why do I daydream about changing it?  Let me re-phrase that:  why do WE daydream about changing it?  Based on many of the RP chatrooms I’ve visited, I know that this is something we all struggle with, and I don’t think daydreaming about being perfectly sighted is necessarily unhealthy.  But I do think that we should pay attention to how we view ourselves and the vocabulary that goes along with those views, especially the “n” word.