NAME: Claire Morley
AGE: 45
WHERE ARE YOU: Bury, Lancashire
COMMUNICATION METHOD: Email, text messages using inverted colours and large text, limited lip reading, some deafblind manual sign language.
YEAR OF USHER DIAGNOSIS: 1997
USHER TYPE: USH2A
FAMILY/CHILDREN: Married to Craig, one daughter.
CAREER: Previously a Social Care Officer ,and also a teacher of students with additional needs.
HOBBIES: Arts and crafts, walking.
NAME THREE WORDS TO DESCRIBE YOU: Fun, resilient, positive.
WHAT ARE YOU SURPRISINGLY GOOD AT: Reading people?s body language.
WHO IS SOMEONE YOU ADMIRE AND WHY? I admire Michelle Obama for taking a situation she didn?t entirely chose for herself and making it a triumph.
WHAT ARE YOU HAPPIEST DOING? Spending time with my family and guide dog Thea.
WHAT WOULD BE YOUR PERSONAL MOTTO: Keep things simple
TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT THE IMAGE/PHOTO YOU ATTACH: The images I?ve chosen is of me on a beach in North Yorkshire. It?s a beach I played on as a child and now my child plays on it. Having Usher syndrome does not stop me from being a parent, in fact it gives me additional strengths that I may not otherwise have – patience, understanding, a variety of communication skill, empathy and adaptable problem solving skills.
IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SHARE ANY PARTICULAR USHER STORY YOU CAN DO SO HERE:
I did not start using a long cane until I was 41. I was long overdue needing to use one but it is a very personal hurdle to overcome, accepting that your eyesight has crossed that threshold from ?coping? to ?needing visible help?.
I was on a special shopping trip on my birthday, in a large department store, when I fell. I had tripped up over the base of two life-size mannequins. I had not seen them. As I laid sprawled across the floor , other shoppers rushed to help me. Luckily I had just started using a ?symbol cane? and this visual clue stopped me from having to explain that I wasn?t drunk or clumsy – I was visually impaired.
But it really unsettled me. It was the fall I had been dreading. The fall I had tried to avoid for years by limiting the places I went to, the times I went, who I went with, even if I went at all. My world had become very small.
I decided I needed, for my own safety and others, to take the plunge and get my long white and red cane, and mobility training.? It opened up a whole new world for me and as soon as I experienced the relief of feeling safe, I no longer cared about what it might look like to others. Thea my dual purpose guide dog followed a year later and I?ve loved every minute with my trusty helpers.
If you have signed up to be one of the ?Faces of CUREUsher? and would like to take part in this series, then please do send an email to us at?contact@cureusher.org?and we will get back to you asap.