Zoe Fudge-Ajadi: Being the architect of my own BRIGHT future.

I was born profoundly Deaf and I’ve been slowly losing my vision ever since.  Now all I can see of the world is through a blurry tunnel.

My sister has the same condition, but her journey of sight loss has been worse than mine.  She lost more of her vision earlier than I did, and she’s hit so many barriers along the way without any proper support in place.  As the years passed the change in her has been palpable.

I thought about this for such a long time.  How was I going to make a change, for my sister, and for myself?  Then I met another mum from my children’s school named Vicki Ashmore.

She and I made a funny pair – me, from England and a BSL user, and her, an American with only the slightest grasp of ASL! Somehow through a lot of tea shared whilst sitting on my living room floor we found we both understood each other in a way that transcended language – and I learned that her daughter had communication problems and her grandmother was deafblind.

That’s when I realised that I could tell her my dreams: to set up a group for DeafBlind people that focused on the positive, what we COULD do, whilst remaining aware and sensitive about what we couldn’t do.

Vicki eventually knew enough BSL to tell me she would be there all the way! We kept pushing each other and brainstorming to achieve something special.  Finally we decided to set up BRIGHT.

Why BRIGHT?  I wanted the name and logo to reflect my journey through life. We wanted to use a positive word, not to dwell on the darkness that threatened to envelop me but to focus on the light at the end of my tunnel. Even the capital letters are important – to remind people that with a few large fonts or other things the Boffins call ‘reasonable adjustments’ I can still do what I used to do.

We launched BRIGHT in 2015 with a simple coffee morning.  We were both so nervous.  Neither of us had met any other people like my sister and me before!

We were amazed that so many DeafBlind people, people I’d never met before, turned up – The room was full of Deafblind people, their Guides, their dogs, my God it was an amazing, emotional day!

But most importantly, this was all the proof I needed:  That there was a gap in the market – a need for a group to cater specifically for the needs of people like me, that wouldn’t treat us as Deafblind people but would treat us as People who were also Deafblind.

This was my opportunity to learn from others, but also to empower myself.  I’d be the architect of my own future!  With Vicki as my trusty sidekick, BRIGHT has grown and taken on a life of its own, and we’ve been running ever since.

So now, what do we do? We still set up those coffee mornings every other month.  But on alternate months Vicki and I get to work researching different events and opportunities.

I  always make sure that we try one major physical challenge once a year.  Once we climbed the O2!  Some people thought we were crazy to try and bring a Deafblind group “Up the O2”, but I thought, why not?  Why wouldn’t we climb the O2??  It may have taken us a bit longer, but there we were at the top, thinking that nothing could stop us from achieving our dreams.

Sometimes it feels like people don’t understand how hard life can be when you’re Deaf and Visually Impaired.  But I’m on a mission:  To teach the world that with a few minor adjustments and a bit of patience, you’ll see we are the same old people we always were.

And as I always tell my fellow Deafblind members, there’s no need to despair.  Others don’t understand?  We do. Don’t have support?  We’ll support each other.  Because really, the future is BRIGHT.

For more information, email brightdeafblind@gmail.com.