Holly and All who want, or need information and assistance. this is not
Ken, but your friendly old rehab teacher, Carl, with some thoughts.
First, because we are each constructed slightly differently than anyone
else, approaching effective training must be on an individual basis. But in
your studies, Holly, you already know this.
My suggestion is that we come at each new client with a clean slate. By
that I mean an open mind. Do not assume anything. Let the client or friend
with the eye condition explain to you, both by word and action, just what
they are feeling and seeing. We Humans are just too tempted to put folks
into little boxes. So we draw these general similarities and apply them to
all sorts of folks, saying, "There! You must do thus and such because you
are in this big box marked Macular Degeneration"...or Glaucoma...or RP, etc.
And then we proceed to serve the Box rather than the person. While this may
bring about some improvement, it usually leaves the individual somewhat
frustrated.
So lesson One is to be certain that you do not look for the answers in a
book or a training manual. Look for answers from within the client or
friend. Even if you never completely resolve their situation, you will most
certainly have won their confidence and respect.
Second, and an equally important lesson is to never superimpose your values
on the person you are helping. My worst failures came when I doggedly
insisted that a student do exactly what I said, in the way I did it, and
anything else was just plain wrong.
It dawned on me one fine day, as a student threw his Braille book across the
room and stormed out of the building, that my approach might be just a
little off base. After all, one Carl Jarvis was more than enough for the
world to handle. Why did I want to create an army of little carbon copies?
Rehab is not a question of right and wrong. It is a matter of getting the
job done for the individual.
A middle aged woman was referred to our rehab program here on the Olympic
Peninsula. She had RP and it was slowly closing in. She was not too steady
on her feet and was a bit on the fluffy side. She was very frightened of
falling. No matter how we approached the subject she would not use a travel
cane, or a support cane. But she would use a walker.
Later, at a State Rehabilitation Council meeting, I reported with some pride
how this woman who had been afraid to leave the safety of her apartment was
now zipping around Port Townsend, joining groups, visiting nursing homes,
speaking to school children, and feeling real good about herself.
One of my NFB friends rose up proclaiming that I had failed because this
woman had not come to terms with herself as a blind person.
"But wait a minute," I protested, "She's doing everything we could have
hoped for, except she's doing it while using a walker as her travel aid".
Of course I did not sway my friend's opinion, nor did I really care to. In
my heart of hearts I knew that if this friend had been the woman's rehab
teacher, she would still be holed up in her apartment, because the NFB
friend would have never considered trying a walker.
Finally, lesson Three is simply this: Time and energy.
The program I currently work in has limits of how much time and how much
money can be given to the training of each person. And of course it is not
nearly enough.
There are no set time frames, if you and your client or friend are going to
have a successful outcome. It takes time to figure out how to incorporate
small successes, building upon one another and growing into bigger successes
until one fine day, Poof! Super Blind emerges.
Time and patience. If a client struggles and feels they are failing, we go
back and do those things that they saw as positive events. Maybe, as with
the client we stole and held captive for a week, maybe it would be to go
back to the kitchen and make another couple of loaves of bread. And once
the smile is back, off we go again.
This is getting to be book length, so I'll close by saying Never, Ever take
your eyes or ears or heart off the person you are working with. There are
many experts eager to tell you just how to do the job. But that person is
your expert. Listen to them and learn what they need, and together you just
might succeed.
Carl Jarvis
----- Original Message -----
From: "Holly Kaczmarski" <holly.b.kaczmarski@gmail.com>
To: "'Ken Metz'" <kenmetz1946@gmail.com>; "'Carl Jarvis'"
<carjar82@gmail.com>; "'Mitch Pomerantz'" <mitch.pomerantz@earthlink.net>;
"'Alice Dampman Humel'" <alicedh@verizon.net>; "'Ronald E. Milliman'"
<rmilliman@insightbb.com>
Cc: "'acb-l'" <acb-l@acb.org>
Sent: Sunday, June 02, 2013 12:49 PM
Subject: RE: [acb-l] The Travel Issue and Ken Jernigan
Ken,
What would you suggest to help an adult person who is losing sight due to
age-related macular degeneration to help them learn their way around? Many
of these people in my blindness group are fearful because they did not pay
attention when they could see and now that their vision is diminishing, they
don't know their way around and get lost and are afraid to try to orient
themselves to their community, even their own neighborhood. They rely on
Dial-A-Ride to take them around and they never go out alone even to the
local corner grocery store. They stay home and wait for others to take them
places or use para transit and they are losing their independence.
Do you have any suggestions as to how they can practice learning routes and
overcoming their fears. A lot of it depends on personality I realize. Many
people are determined to do something and you can't stop them and they
usually do quite well. Those who are more timid and have a personality that
keeps them home unless they have someone taking them places, have a fear of
change. As a travel trainer, I try to help them lose their fears but it is
very difficult for some people as they get older.
Thanks for any tips.
Holly
-----Original Message-----
From: acb-l-bounces@acb.org [mailto:acb-l-bounces@acb.org] On Behalf Of Ken
Metz
Sent: Sunday, June 02, 2013 12:32 PM
To: 'Carl Jarvis'; 'Mitch Pomerantz'; 'Alice Dampman Humel'; 'Ronald E.
Milliman'
Cc: 'acb-l'
Subject: Re: [acb-l] The Travel Issue and Ken Jernigan
I am a person who is blind due to RLF, and I've had very good travel ability
all of my life with decent directional capability. I think a big part of
that depends on how old you are when you learn cardinal directions and are
allowed some freedom of travel be it around your house, around your block,
around your neighborhood, etc. When I was ten years old, I was in a blind
Boy Scout troop in Chicago, and our leader was a man in his 40's or 50's who
was blind. We met every Friday evening, and for about 20 or 30 minutes each
week he drilled us on the main streets of Chicago, what direction they ran
and what the postal grid was all about by addresses. I also lived in a
neighborhood where stores were down the street and around the corner and was
taught, even without a cane in those days long ago, how to get to a few of
them and would go and get one or two or three items for the family from the
time I was six or seven years old. I also roller skated and later rode a
bike through the alleys where I used the sides of the buildings with facial
vision (echo location) in order to ride. So I contribute some or all of my
ability with directions to be based on doing things requiring directions at
an early age.
KEN
-----Original Message-----
From: acb-l-bounces@acb.org [mailto:acb-l-bounces@acb.org] On Behalf Of Carl
Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, June 02, 2013 12:02 PM
To: Mitch Pomerantz; 'Alice Dampman Humel'; 'Ronald E. Milliman'
Cc: 'acb-l'
Subject: Re: [acb-l] The Travel Issue and Ken Jernigan
Mitch,
Yes, many of the RLF folks seem to have some spatial issues. But my good
friend Sue Ammeter is one exception to that theory. I'd need to think about
it before saying I know many others...oh yes, another woman now living in
Walla Walla. Maybe some of the RLF's can comment.
Carl Jarvis
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mitch Pomerantz" <mitch.pomerantz@earthlink.net>
To: "'Alice Dampman Humel'" <alicedh@verizon.net>; "'Ronald E. Milliman'"
<rmilliman@insightbb.com>
Cc: "'acb-l'" <acb-l@acb.org>
Sent: Sunday, June 02, 2013 11:55 AM
Subject: Re: [acb-l] The Travel Issue and Ken Jernigan
This is an issue separate and apart from blindness, I think. I was told
years ago that many babies born prematurely and whose optic nerves were
permanently damaged by receiving too much oxygen likewise had the part of
the brain that processes spacial relationships destroyed as well. I've
known a number of such blind folks who truly cannot find their way around
even very proscribed environments. Additionally, I know at least two other
blind persons with significant difficulty in managing spacial relations
issues who were not born prematurely. It should be noted that I've known a
lot of sighted individuals with similar problems; the difference is that if
they can visually locate a landmark, they're fine. I've lost track of the
number of sighted folks to whom I've given directions over the decades.
Mitch
_____
From: acb-l-bounces@acb.org [mailto:acb-l-bounces@acb.org] On Behalf Of
Alice Dampman Humel
Sent: Saturday, June 01, 2013 1:04 PM
To: Ronald E. Milliman
Cc: 'acb-l'
Subject: Re: [acb-l] The Travel Issue and Ken Jernigan
Ron
So do you know what happened to her subsequently?
I think a possible answer to your question is that sighted people swear they
can't do anything without seeing it.
How many sighted and/or newly blinded adults swear they can't watch TV,
can't use the stove, can't find their way around, on and on.until they
surprise themselves and find that with training, with help, with patience
and a little creativity and imagination, hey, they can do all of those
things and more.
I think many sighted people panic when they can't see the door to the phone
booth, and they don't think it through, they don't feel around for the door
or the door handle, they descend into blind (sorry for the bad pun) panic
because they can't see what they're looking for the way they've done all
their lives.
So, as I said at the beginning, I wonder where she is today, how well she
functions, etc.?
Alice
On Jun 1, 2013, at 1:13 PM, "Ronald E. Milliman" <rmilliman@insightbb.com>
wrote:
Re O&M skills
I am going to share with you a true scenario that sounds so unbelievable
that if I hadn't observed it myself, I would not believe it. Many years ago
when I was at Guiding Eyes for the Blind in New York getting my first Guide
Dog, one of the ladies in our group had such poor O&M skills that she got
lost in the pay phone booth that was at the end of the hall. She got in the
phone booth with assistance, had one of the trainers dial the phone number
for her, and when she was done with her call, she started pounding on the
sides of the phone booth and yelling: "let me out of here!" What I don't
understand to this day is that this lady lost her eye sight later in life;
she was probably in her mid-40's or early 50's, and she had good eye sight
most of her life. If she knew what a phone booth looked like and how the
doors on a phone booth worked, why would she get so disorientated that she
could not find her way out?
In her case, all of us who were there to get guide dogs felt this lady
should never been accepted into the training program unless and until she
had gained much, much better O&M skills. We felt so sorry for her poor dog!
Ron M.
Dr. Ronald E. Milliman, retired Professor Western Kentucky University
Ph: 270-782-9325
Email: rmilliman@insightbb.com
Chair, American Council of the Blind Public Relations Committee
Chair, American Council of the Blind's Monthly Monetary Support Program
(MMS) Committee
President: South Central Kentucky Council of the Blind (SCKCB)
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