Hannah’s story transcript
Hannah:
I’m Hannah, I’m 21. Last year on a girls’ holiday in Greece we went on a foam party night. The next day we were fine, I fell ill on that night. We were in hotel room when we realised. I’d woke up and I’d asked my friends to put the lights on and they asked what I was talking about, it was bright daylight.
Hannah’s mum:
The doctor actually did say to me, “She’s blind”, which she was at the time, she was totally blind, and he said it won’t come back because it’s methanol poisoning.
Hannah:
It’s a substitute to alcohol, which basically waters it down to make it go further to the bars. I’d obviously drunk it on the night out.
Hannah’s mum:
We were absolutely devastated. We just thought her life was over.
Hannah:
I remember hearing them, like, crying, um… they probably thought the same as me, that it was absolutely devastating, can’t ever do a lot again. Because it happened overnight we had no idea where to start. My optician referred me to RNIB who put us in touch with the Sight Loss Adviser at James Cook.
Angela:
As a Sight Loss Adviser I support people. I’m sort of like the first point of contact from seeing the consultant, maybe getting the news about sight loss.
Hannah:
Angela the Sight Loss Adviser, when we’d seen her at James Cook, she explained what the process is, how it works, what emotions you’ll go through. We would’ve struggled if there wasn’t anyone like Angela.
Angela:
When Hannah came to see me, to be honest with you, I was… I did sort of sit up a little bit more in my chair and was very concerned of the situation.
Hannah:
I was still quite poorly at the time so everything we were doing, my mum was mainly coordinating between me and Angela, but yeah, we… I rang her a lot, my mum rang her a lot.
Hannah’s mum:
She was just really good, she just said get in touch anytime you want and we did. I even went on my own and sat with her and cried. She was really good.
Hannah:
When I found out it’s not going to come back I thought I’d be using a stick, I thought I’d have to quit my job. I literally did think it was like, pretty much like the end of everything.
Angela:
I just said, before we discuss anything else, or any of the support that’s needed, can I just please say do not leave your job. You know, don’t think that you can’t do the job because there’s gonna be support available.
Hannah:
She encouraged me to go back to work, she said, you can, you can use the equipment, she said you can go back to work, it just takes time. So she arranged getting me registered blind, she’d… give us little hand-held magnifiers to help me get by with reading things that I needed to at the time.
Hannah’s mum:
At first she was very upset obviously, and I am surprised at how quickly she has become independent.
Angela:
Since I first met Hannah her confidence has grown, you know, massively.
Angela in sync:
Do you want to come down?
Angela:
So she’s just come on leaps and bound really. Her mum seems to be a lot more content and calm, you know, it was quite hard at the beginning.
Angela sync:
You seem quite chirpy, are you feeling a lot better?
Hannah sync:
Yeah, I can get around easier and…
Angela sync:
Can you?
Hannah sync:
You make up your own tricks and tips, don’t you?
Angela sync:
Yeah, you do, it’s like learning again, isn’t it?
Hannah sync:
Yeah.
Angela:
I’ve spoke to her about how her job’s going, she is very interested in the Sight Loss Adviser role and she’s doing a bit of volunteering.
Angelasync:
Here’s some information there for you, Hannah.
Hannah sync:
Thank you.
Hannah:
At the minute I work in a doctor’s surgery, which is great, I love it there, but since I’ve lost my sight my interest’s definitely shifted to working with sight loss, which is why I wanted to volunteer.
Hannah’s mum:
She has done a couple of bits and pieces with them and she come back and she said, “Mum, I really enjoyed that.”
Hannah:
Without Angela we really wouldn’t have known where to start, she was out first point of call, we still keep in touch, we’ve got her phone number if we ever need anything. She just helped us do everything really. We wouldn’t have known what to do if she wasn’t there.
Text:
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RNIB Supporting people with sight loss.