Simon meets the challenge
A FORMER Royal Marine who lost his sight nearly 10 years ago has launched his third book about coping with blindness.
Simon Mahoney, who lives in Brookside, Ashbourne, lost his sight through hereditary glaucoma in 2012, but he adapted quickly to the challenges it brought, and has carried on living an independent lifestyle despite losing his wife several years ago.
The former professional artist found writing acted as a new creative outlet for him and his first book, A Descent into Darkness, hit the shelves in 2016, and charted the journey he had taken from realising he was going to lose his sight, to being registered as severely blind.
Since then he has published another book, “First, Catch Your Rabbit”, aimed at helping visually impaired people to navigate their kitchens and safely prepare a meal, and now his third book was launched last week.
“Winging it Blind” is described by Simon as “the truth about sight loss and how to survive it” and it sees him opening up about how he has learned to live with his impairment, and not to let it ruin his life.
He uses his personal story to outline the problems and solutions he has discovered and established through his transition to total blindness.
Published on November 15, and available by visiting www.wingingitblind.com, he says the book is full of practical ideas and answers for anyone whose sight is at risk and for those who care for them.
He said: “There’s no shortcut to managing the overwhelming world of blindness but, with hard work and commitment, we can reinvent ourselves and find the way back to being fully paid-up valued members of society.
“My mantra is ‘We are not disabled; it’s what others do or don’t do that disables us.’
“Rather than spending the rest of our days in the ‘disabled’ box, we must keep climbing out and changing what is possible.”
Simon hopes that, as with A Descent into Darkness, his new book will be an invaluable guide for professionals in the field as well as those facing sight loss, those already blind, and their supporters. In the book, he explores five distinct levels of change and survival: essential knowledge; management and adaptation; engagement with the real world; practical steps towards independence; and sight loss and society.
The first four are packed with information and advice while the last draws on Simon’s personal perceptions and experience. He concludes with a holistic and strategic analysis of sight loss as a looming social crisis. He champions sight safeguarding - identifying causes of increasing sight loss, such as pollution, diet and toxins in water), and what society and individuals can do to protect eye health.
My mantra is ‘We are not disabled; it’s what others do or don’t do that disables us’.
Simon Mahoney