Blindness and Anxiety

I’m so glad to have seen some recent discussions of blindness and mental health, and how these two things can come hand in hand. These conversations are becoming more acceptable and it is so important that we talk openly about it.

I worry constantly. And so many of these worries are fuelled, if indirectly, by my blindness.

Are people watching me? Are they thinking that I don’t know what I’m doing because I’m blind? If I decline help, then take a wrong turning, will that reinforce their perception that I am in need of help and don’t know what I’m doing?

Do people hate my clothes? Do they think I dress a certain way because I’m blind, not because it’s how I feel most comfortable? Should I express who I am through the clothes I wear, or will people just feel sorry for me because I mustn’t know what I’m doing and how terrible I look?

What if I wash my clothes, the colours run and nobody tells me? Should I check my clothes every time I wash them? What if I forget? What if people see that I’ve made this mistake?

Did I smudge my makeup? Do I have time to call someone to check? If I don’t call someone, and I have, will anyone tell me? Will they feel too awkward? Will they feel sorry for me? Should I just not wear makeup? But if I don’t, will people think I can’t apply it because I’m blind?

Are people watching me eat? Do I look normal? Do I look out of place?

Should I ask for directions? What if the person refuses to give directions and wants to come with me? What if I say no and they don’t listen? What if they touch me? Am I already too stressed to handle physical contact?

Will someone pet my dog? Will they tell me I can’t get in their taxi or enter their business because she is with me? Will they listen when I ask them not to? Will they shout at me? Will I get overwhelmed and shout at them? Are they angry with me? Should I have pushed their hand away?

This is the constant stream that goes through my head. Every. Single. Day.

I’m not going to tell you that all blind people feel like this. I’m sure that not all of them do. But equally I don’t think I’m the only one who finds myself worrying about these kinds of things. It’s ok. This is something I’m learning to tell myself. That it’s ok to feel like this, and that it isn’t shameful. But also that I can and will develop strategies for dealing with it.

We need to be more open about mental health in general. And I also think it’s very hard when you already have a disability to be open and say that your anxiety may be related to that. Because I know that people already feel sorry for me, and I don’t want them to continue to feel that way. I want people to understand that a lot of my anxiety comes not from being blind, but from how the world isn’t set up for blind people to access it as easily as sighted people.

Do I think blindness and anxiety can come hand in hand, as the article I linked to says. Yes, absolutely. For some people it may be the anxiety of stepping out into the world, of advocating or adapting to vision loss. For me it is a constant stream of worries about how I am perceived by the wider world, and if I’m already too stressed and overwhelmed to handle more intrusive comments or unwanted physical contact.

I have always known that I will need to be better than sighted people to be treated like an equal. My whole childhood was spent being told that I needed to out-perform my sighted peers, because I would always have to prove myself. This is painfully true, but I’m sure you can imagine the pressure of trying to live up to that expectation every day. Any small, human failure can feel like I’ve let myself down. Being less than perfect doesn’t feel like an option, even though I know I’ve been set an impossible standard to live up to.

So here’s a reminder to all of us, including myself, to be a little kinder to ourselves. Take a breath, take a minute to yourself and remember that making mistakes is part of being human. You are not worth less because of it.