One Hour of being Blind & Deaf

Assignment Part Two
Complete the following exercise.

Blind/Deaf Exercise
Spend one hour either "blind" or "deaf" in a safe situation of your choice and then write a page describing your experience. The first part should consist of a narrative description of your experience, the action of what happened, and the second half should cover an explanation [exposition] of what you learned from the experiment.
Although the exercise covers two different modes of writing, it should be written as a single assignment.
This does not have to be a really long assessment, just share with us what it was like.



My experience with being deaf and blind

I didn't want to do this part of the assignment, for reasons which will have to be told now. I have avoided letting anyone know this part about me since I have been here, it's very private you see, but I really don't know how to be dishonest with this one.


Blind

I actually didn't have to pretend or act out this assignment. You see... I was told four years ago that I am going blind, but it could be slow or not, that there is no way of telling in my situation. I'll not get into that right now because that is not the assignment.

If I want to experience being blind, all I have to do is turn the lights down very low or no lights and just the light from the T.V. shining and my whole world goes completely black. A condition I have. So I walk around often in complete blackness when I wake in the middle of the night and only a nightlight on, it is the same as no light being on. That is when panic sets in, wondering if this is the day that I will lose my sight forever. My experience with being blind is sometimes frightening, and I have panic attacks because of it until I can bump around long enough to find the light switch. Only when I find the light and switch it on and can still see with it on do I calm down. Being blind is a scary feeling for me, even though I know how many steps it takes to get to everything in my home, it is still scary and not something that I look forward to in the future. But all the same I know how to take care of myself in total darkness, including cooking. For now, I can still see with special glasses with the lights on and in daylight. Thank GOD for the light.



Deaf

The Deaf part is fairly easy too. I wear hearing aides. You can't see them because they fit down into my ear. If I want to look at something and not hear, I just take them out. I learned long ago how to read lips a little, but I have refused to sign language, although I can sign. To me that is the ultimite 'give-up'. And I refuse to give up on anything. I can hear sounds but they are all mixed together. To me being deaf isn't as bad as being blind. Being deaf you can still be a part of things just without hearing. You are not limited to staying in familiar surroundings. Opposed to being blind, you are kind of restricted to staying in well known places and you can drive, or do a lot of things that you would need your eye sight for that is not nessary to have your hearing to do.

These are my 'one hour' experiences with being Deaf and Blind. I can see that I really need this class in order to learn how to tell stories about myself that are made up instead of having to write about the real me that is so private.

Sunrise class lesson 3-part two.
Cissy