Training newly-blinded adults

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32971, 18 July 1972, Page 18

Training newly-blinded adults

Last year, managing five Queenstown motel units, along with making a home for her husband, a carpenter and joiner, and three children, was all in a day’s work for Mrs Mavis Woodall.

Today she is separated from her family, relearning simple domestic skills she’d had at her fingertips for 42 years—how to cut bread straight; to serve meals; to knit without looking. For almost overnight. Mavis Woodall became completely blind. A trip to the optician to have her glasses changed resulted in tests which indicated an advanced brain tumour. The growth had pressed on, and killed, both optic nerves. “But I was so relieved to be alive when a benign growth was successfully removed, that at the time this seemed a small price to pay,” she said over lunch at the adult rehabilitation unit at Auckland’s Homai College, the New Zealand Foundation for the Blind’s residential school and education centre at Manurewa. “I still feel the same. I sometimes get depressed, and it’s not easy to adjust. But the rewards are so great that you’re prepared to put your heart and soul into everything. And the companionship of others here in similar situations helps to give confidence.

Back to the world

“I’m not the kind to sit at home and think. And I’m not the kind to go to continual afternoon teas. I’m going to go back to the sighted world.” That means back to her husband, William, fifth-form daughter Fay (16), and son Ross (nearly 13). Her elder daughter. Anne, works in a Gore bank. And back to take over from her mother-in-law, who stepped in in the emergency. “She’s been wonderful. And I don’t anticipate any problems when I go home,” Mrs Woodall said. “Makeup’s no problem—l’ve only ever worn lipstick. And I’ll have to sew labels inside my clothes, so that I know which is the back and which is the right side. My hair’s easy. After the operation, it’s still only an inch long ail over. So I wear a wig, and that’s no trouble to brush up. I could be had with runs in my stockings though . . The adult rehabilitation unit, is the only purposebuilt unit of its type in Australia and New Zealand, said man in charge. English-born Mr Winston Bann. Others have been adapted from existing buildings. There is accommodation for 12, but groups on the basic 13-week course usually consist of eight or nine. Eight adults, four men and four women aged from 16 to 68— from Balclutha. Dunedin, Queenstown, Christchurch. Whangarei, Auckland, and one from South Africa—are currently in residence at the Homai unit, which aims to serve newly-blinded adults.

Relearning skills

“Of course, we can’t confine the place to these cases,” Mr Bann said. “We usually have a cross-section of adults, ranging from late teens to, depending on health and physical ability, 65 or 70 year olds. “We have only four teachers, and of necessity, much instruction must be individual. These people are relearning skills a sighted person takes for granted, and at the same time coping with an emotional upset. “They respond very well, and for this reason I am not prepared to deviate from a policy of individual treatQment to fill the residential (quarters. There are always (vacancies in the teaching field, but the right people don’t always apply. You’ve got to be* reasonably well (adjusted in your own life, (before you can hope to help pnyone with any problems at bill.”

I The unit consists of a dining-room and kitchen (though main meals come on a hot trolley from the college kitchen), laundry, lounge, 'recreation room, handicraft room, mobility and communication areas, and a treatment and cleaned; he does his own room for minor accidents. Each resident has his own single study-bedroom which he is expected to keep dusted and celaned; he does his own washing, ironing, and, with assistance, repairs to clothing; and adheres to a roster system for dishes and preparing supper.

Daily living

The course at the adults rehabilitation unit includes training in mobility, braille, typing, handwriting, homecraft, manual dexterity, and techniques of daily living.

And social life is no small part of the programme. For, pointed out Mr Bann, the unit can so easily become a “safe sanctuary.” To eliminate this danger, new arrivals are soon taken on a trip to the local Cosmopolitan Club. (The local R.S.A. and Cosmopolitan clubs have offered honorary membership to anyone from the unit.)

“We explain the lay-out, where the bar and the toilets are,” Mr Bann said. “They; have a beer in a friendly atmosphere, are made welcome, and look forward to returning. We have approached all the sports and I service clubs in Manurewa,l from judo and indoor bowls.l

to Rotary and Jaycees, and have had a wonderful response.

“For instance, every Tuesday a group goes to a local indoor bowls club. And a boating club takes fishing trips out on the harbour at weekends.” In the handicraft field, the unit tries to avoid canework, because, said Mr Bann, “everyone associates the blind with canework, playing the piano and ■ reading braille.”

Neighbours don’t help, he added. “They refer to so and so, the blind man. His personality is shattered.” So at Homai, the adults in rehabilitation try leather work, mosaic work, painting, woodcarving, pottery (with fimo, an elaborate plasticine, which can be used repeatedly till baked), making soft toys and lino cuttings.

Regular discussions

Mr Bann repeated: “There’s too much emphasis today on the fact that a blind person cannot see. We have regular discussions here, partially blind, newly blind, congenitally blind and sighted individuals all contributing. And we emphasise that it is a sighted world, and that even the blind must adhere to regulations set in that world. “So they follow radio and television programmes. We igo to things like the Easter [Show, Rugby matches, the ' races . . . There’s an atmosphere there, something in ’the air that can’t be reproiduced and you’ve got to go to experience this.” Mr Bann first cam» to New [Zealand on holiday 3 years ago, a welfare worker who had worked with the blind in the North Midlands of England. He returned five years ago, with his English wife and child, Carl, now 7. Their daughter I odd (3) was bom here.

He keeps his work quite [separate from his home life. | “If you let it, this job takes over your whole life, and This must be detrimental. I I get a great deal of satisfaction out of it. But I like to [leave it all behind, and play [squash or go fishing when I get home.”

From South Africa

Short-haired blonde Pam Morgan (25), came to the rehabilitation unit from her home in the Southern Transvaal, South Africa. The trip was a Christmas present from her parents—“because we have nothing similar at home,” she said, pausing from knitting a bright red sweater. “And the course has done a lot for me, especially in mobility.” An attractive, long-haired Maori, Kahui (Katie) Maunsell, partially sighted from birth, finds the course has “helped me move around at night more easily. I can’t

see anything then. And I can also do more sewing now. I’ve just finished making some jeans and a dress.” Mr Napier Thomas, formerly of Palmerston North, in the timber trade, has had dwindling vision for the last six years—“all part and parcel of a diabetic complaint I’ve had for 30 years,” he said.

Marriage planned

“The course here has done a lot for me—for example, when I go to a restaurant, I know how not to look like a country hick. I know what to do. “Living with this sight problem, I grew to accept it. If it had happened overnight, it would have knocked me. It took me six months to get over the fact I couldn’t drive. But it’s not as bad as it sounds. There’s always something worth while to strive for.” And in the case of Mr Thomas, it’s looking forward to his marriage—“to a blind lass” —at Labour week-end. “I’m 42, she heads me off by about 12 months. We met at the Foundation for the Blind last September. My sight was reasonable then, so I’ve a fair idea of what she looks like.”