Blind Scream and Lost Identity

Written by Bridget Toal
Dan Lubas, Editor

Introduction

This was written three years after Bridget became blind. The original purpose was to help in recovery but when read today it educates people both with and without sight. As a sighted person, I find this account disturbing and wonder if I could cope with losing mysight. As you read this put yourself in Bridget’s shoes, how would you react?

Who am I? Years have gone by. When I was sighted I thought it was bad that I couldn’t get out of the eighties. Now I am frozen in time in my mind.

What defines you to a stranger? What is a first impression based on?

How do we control prisoners? What is the first thing we do to people who join the military? Catholic schools, nuns, monks. Uniformity, no identity. In prison everyone is given a standard uniform. There is no status; nothing to make one better than the other. The military strips you of everything you once were. Everyone is the same, created equal. Catholic schools use uniforms to remove status, focus on education and forget superficial possessions.

During puberty kids push the envelope to define themselves, to be different, to stand out. That is how important your shell is. And that is exactly what that is, a shell. Many can fake a social rank with clothes, pretend to be someone they are not. But what makes you cross a room to talk to someone? What you see on the outside. That does not make your personality. Your personality is what keeps a person interested in you.

The pins you always wear people notice, the crazy shoes you manage to find. Your signature item, the mismatched style that you create tells volumes about you. Are you a conformist or a nonconformist?

Where did that go? I cried for months after losing my sight. Therapy, drugs, nothing helped. I was in an endless whirlwind, going down and down. I felt like I was losing me, myself, who I was, who I worked so hard to become. I couldn’t stop saying, “I am losing me.” “I don’t want to live this life.” Not die, I just didn’t want this life I now had thrusted upon me. What about my trademarks that made me, Bridget? What about the oddities that worked just for me? Where did my control go over my own life? One by one things were being taken away. Small things that you wouldn’t think twice about seemed earth shattering. What about my plan? I worked hard to get what I have and where I am, it was my turn to take care of those who took care of me as a child. My five year plan is gone. The future I was going to provide for my family, gone. I am being financially raped. Sell, sell, sell! Everything I accumulated I have to sell. My income has been slashed in half. Back to family pitching in because I am short this month. I thought those days were over. Where is that future I planned? My house, emptied. All style of junk and meaningless items has now become clutter and obstacles for the blind feeling fingers. Now practicality rules where furniture and items go, not where you want it just because. My career, gone. Now what do I want to do when I grow up? Searching,finding something that is worth getting out of bed for, something that interests me. It took so long to find that career, now it’s gone.

Can you tell me what color my lipstick is?

Show one picture to ten people. You will get ten definitions. Who is defining me? Where did I go? Who can see what I use to be?

Is my personality strong enough to hang on? It has to change. The strong independent person I use to be, gone. Come to me, I will take care of it. I will drive, I will go for that. I have the ability to take care of you. Don’t you worry? No more. The independence is gone. My private life is gone. The midnight run to the supermarket to grab something in the personal care isle has become walking down a runway strip in the spot light.

How many people do you tell that you are having sex? How many people know about what is happening to your body in the bathroom? Maybe it was just you and the walls. Maybe a spouse if you were lucky enough to have one. Now I have no walls, all doors are open. Not that I was a secretive person, I was an open book. But maybe I would like to wait a week, check with the doctor before my news is shared with someone else.

Thank god for e-mail, right? My only private place. All my written letters, general mail, bills, what I bought with my credit card, how much I spent. All open to the eyes of another. A friend, a family member, a volunteer to come and read my mail.

Is my eyeliner smudged?

I go shopping. It was never a pleasant experience in the sighted past by myself. Now, someone must endure my basic frustration, my white hot anger when I just can’t get my mind around what I can’t see. Did they see everything? Do they explain too much? Say goodbye to the method of: I will know it when I see it, now it is items on a list. How do I do that when I haven’t seen the new products? Do they know what I am looking for? Do I? It has only been three years, only 36 months. How many fashion trends have come and gone? I still see fashion in my mind from 2003. How can I tell someone to find something that is frozen in my minds eye? How can I not be frustrated when the same products are not still in the stores? I did not see the deletion of one version and the progression of the new one. What will happen in ten years? Am I still going to see fashion of 2003? Will I understand the new trends and hot items?

Do I want to? Is my hair ok?

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What about my eye? My picture of myself? How do I see myself? Simple, as I looked in 2003; still a frozen image. I gained weight. I know I did because I fit in my clothes differently. It is a cold slap in the face with that reminder. Why can’t I fit in this when it fit just fine in 2003 that seems like yesterday. I’m frozen in time. I never would have allowed myself to become this person, this weight, when I was sighted. You look good. Do I? I lost the extra weight. I am stuck at 30 years old, my hair, skin, weight, style all frozen.

Clothes make the man, right? Was it Einstein that wore the same clothes everyday? A closet with the same seven shirts, pants, tie, jacket, shoes. He did that so he wouldn’t use his brain energy on the matter. How simple. And what a good looking man he was…

How can anyone help you? How can you repress your frustration? How do you quiet the screams in your head?

I am losing me.

If you saw the weight gain you would have never accepted it. Would you have gone out in your pajamas? Who cares now? All the outside, the things that were superficial, are gone. Does that make you better? Who knows? You were never this person before.

How can you make your loved ones feelings of not being able to help be ok? Haven’t you already been raised by your mother? Are you not an adult? At one time didn’t I give my opinion and not worry what it was? Do I now weigh everything said? Watch bridges that are about to burn. Beggars can not be choosers. Don’t bite the hand that feeds you. Stifle. Bite your lip for the better good.

Where is that girl I used to be?

Bet you never noticed how many times you use a public restroom. No big deal right? You try to be quiet, distinguished, still feel mature. It is when you can’t get there without the whole table finding out what is going on. For some reason it is like going to the supermarket for a personal item and they do a price check over the sound system.

You find that you are out of something, or you need to run and get something that you need right now, that option is gone. How many phone calls do you have to make? How many people have to know what you ran out of? How many days in advance must you map out your errands?

Do I have the same color socks on?

Eyes are the windows to the soul. An expression says a thousand words. Body language says what you are unable to say. What? Can you say that out loud?

Where did the look of love go from my partner? Why don’t I see your eyes crinkle when you laugh? How did I miss you looking away because you didn’t want to talk about it?

Were you pulling my leg? Did you give me a sly smile with that comment? Are you smiling because I knew that is exactly what you wanted? Did you like how I looked tonight? Was that a look of desire? Are you even listening? I am sorry, were you talking to me? Did I answer what was directed to the person next to me? Do I wait for them to repeat what they said, or do I keep saying ‘what’?

How fast is his tail wagging? Is there a toy at my feet? A triumphant look at the first time the baby tied her shoes and the babies total look of pure surprise at every peek-a-boo. She can’t be driving, she is only thirteen. Why is his voice deeper? When did he get taller than me? He passed away? But he was fine the last time I saw him. I smell the flowers, I hear the crying, and I know I am at a funeral. Then why do I still reach for the phone to call you? Is that why the holidays hurt so much? When did all of this happen? Everyone stays as they were in 2003, some may like that, frozen time, not aging. Then how did you get older? How is your time to go away here already, when did you grow up, when did they grow old?

Mommy look at me, look at me, look at me. Why are you wearing sunglasses, what are you hiding? Can’t you do that yourself? What, do I have to put it in your hand? Oh my god, I am sorry. I didn’t know. I am so embarrassed.

How long have I lived in this house? Why does that chair keep moving? How many times do I have to hit it?

What time is it? Morning, are you sure? It doesn’t feel it. Is it AM or PM? Where am I? What was that noise? Do I smell smoke? Was that the door?

There is a spot on my shirt? Oh. Thanks.

Why are all the drinks I spill sticky? The buttered bread always lands butter down, right? Dam, where did that pill roll to?

Out of sight out of mind, how does that work for the blind? Would I lose my head if it wasn’t attached?

When did I become so obsessive compulsive? Does it really matter that the remote was put back facing the other direction? When did I get the ability to know if something was moved an inch from its original place?

My shoe is untied?

How did an open door become dangerous? Although my guest does not know, a critical decision is to put the lid down or not in the bathroom. Forget candles. Fire is not a friend.

Remember the game in grade school of boxes with a hole to stick your hand in and you have to guess what is inside of the box? I live in the box, trying to figure out what is around me.

How do I see your look of pain or the secret look to warn me not to say something? How do I get the eyeball signal to make the excuse to leave? Can you picture a look of a loved ones face that is sly, a coy smile, a mischievous wink. That is the whole conversation, no words needed. What about that look of pity. You didn’t want to see that one anyway.

You don’t understand, and you wouldn’t want to. I don’t want to.

I walk down the street, pause at a corner. There are two types of people, the ones that run to help. Very nice, no thank you, I am ok. Or the one that is so silent, not revealing that they are looking, just looking. But I know you are there. I can feel the tightness in my chest; I can feel the weight of the look. There is nothing wrong with either method. I can’t even say which is preferred. A mother hushing a child who asks: why does she have that stick mommy? Knowing as you walk down the street or through a crowd that you are being watched. You are not a side show but not the norm either. How do you watch your child or spouse, loved one struggle, start over with basic functions that you learned as a child? You want to do everything for them, but know it is the best interest for you both for them to do it themselves. No matter how many times they fall down, sit and cry with their face in their hands. You have to stand on the sidelines and remain quiet or leave. If you leave, are you abandoning her? How can you take her pain and fear of this whole process? How can you make it right? That is what you are supposed to do for your loved one, right? You have no clear answers, and neither does she.

Where did that doorway go?

You function everyday. What choice do you have? You manage; all goes well, most of the time. Then there is the crack in the wall, the last straw, the lock starts to give. One simple thing brings everything down. Stops it on a dime. It is like you have not learned anything. The questions of the first few months flood your mind. Who am I now? What am I suppose to do? What do I have to offer now? How can one bad day bring back the smothering pain and grieving, just like it felt on day one? What happened to time will heal. It will hurt less as time goes on. You are never given more than you can handle. Then why am I crying so hard I can’t breathe? Where was that line of, I don’t want to live this life, been hiding? It hides and waits to show its evil face. What do I ask now?

Who was I? Who am I now? Who do I like better? Embrace the fact that you have become: you know her, she is the blind girl.