[IR_Efrem]

My daughter is legally blind. She had a couple birth defects when she was born. We found out 7 months after she was born that she had septo-optic dysplasia (SOD) and optic-nerve hypoplasia (ONH). Children born with these defects are either blind or partially sighted. Often they have severe hormonal discrepancies, downs syndrome, diabetes, and at the time there were not many documented cases of her conditions. Our outlook was very bleak at the time because the majority of children did not live past the age of 12 (or there abouts, kind of difficult to remember the facts that were given to us almost 14 years ago). For those researching SOD or ONH, I would like to say that her mom did not abuse drugs or alcohol during pregnancy, my daughters condition was a complete fluke.

She has adapted to her sight problems very well, she does have glasses of course but they only correct her vision so much. If you met her you would never know anything was wrong at all. After spending many years and a ton of repeated visits to an Endocrinologist, I am also happy to report that she has no problems with her glands that produce hormones. I feel extremely lucky now because her sight is the limit of her problems, considering how many issues she could have had.

I spent a lot of time worrying about her outlook and her future, in the end it was her that taught me to be accepting and much more positive. These words, "special and disabled" mean nothing to me at all, nor do I care about who uses them either for demeaning or uplifting. My children all all "precious" to me, I care little about anything that anyone has to say.

This story is inspirational and I am glad that this woman is finding newer methods to help everyone reach out a bit more.