Going blind

[Adeptandy]

Wasn’t sure where to post this so admins move if required please.
Dads 84, last 2 weeks been to and fro at hospital due to sudden sight loss in his good eye. He’s been partially sighted in the other for 44 years. About to lose his driving licence and can no longer read ( of which he does a lot ) so how can I access books that are spoken ? Im looking at Amazon Audible but my main concern is no internet or even tech savy. Mum still runs a Nokia 3310 for mobile to give you an idea.
Any experience of how to proceed would be welcome.

 

[Lili]

Contact RNIB they should be able to help with all sorts of things. I'm sure that you can get audio CDs by post for no charge if registered blind/partially sighted. Your local library might help as they should also have audio books and CDs which may be available to borrow free for people with a sight problem

Home

If you're affected by sight loss, we're here for you

www.rnib.org.uk

 

[matthew]

Maybe contact local Age Concern - or whatever they call themselves now. My late mum and step dad used to read into a tape books, news items etc. and these were given, hired or lent out to people with sight problems.

 

[som farmer]

with great diplomatic skills, and patience.
F in Law, same age, but still living on his own, and dementia, getting worse. Has had cataracts 'done' on both eyes, and they didn't 'work'.

he gets very very frustrated, when he can no longer do things, he always could do. Very 'worried' about money, not that he need be, but he was always on top of his finances, Sis in law does that now, mrs does his shopping, and running around. There are groups about, which have plenty of good helpful ideas. Use them. Quite a lot of financial help too, plus the basic things like big print, outings, and lots of good advice.

When he gets really frustrated, he takes it out on the two of them, and you just have to bite your tongue, and realise its not 'him'.

The time will come, when he needs to move, but he will then lose all he is familiar with, and a rapid downward spiral, is what we expect, hopefully we are wrong.

But you can only be there, your mum will be struggling, so think of her, she has him every day.

The other advice l would suggest, is do not ask him how he is, you get a discourse, which leaves both of you feeling 'bad'.

Grandkids, or great g/kids, seem to 'lift' him up to another level, he gets very emotional about them, afterwards. But its in a 'good' way.

Good luck, just remember how frustrating it all is, for him.

 

[theboytheboy]

Wasn’t sure where to post this so admins move if required please.
Dads 84, last 2 weeks been to and fro at hospital due to sudden sight loss in his good eye. He’s been partially sighted in the other for 44 years. About to lose his driving licence and can no longer read ( of which he does a lot ) so how can I access books that are spoken ? Im looking at Amazon Audible but my main concern is no internet or even tech savy. Mum still runs a Nokia 3310 for mobile to give you an idea.
Any experience of how to proceed would be welcome.

Any decent libraries near you? You might still get audio books on tapes or cds from them.

 

[Av Gorritt]

When the O.H was registered "partially sighted" , I'm not sure how it happened but we got a housecall from an RNIB worker - really helpful person who had a "goodie bag " with all kinds of aids for poor sight , all free , nothing too much trouble for her - lighted magnifying glasses, reading aids , and "much much more " . She kept in touch too !

 

[zero]

Might be difficult to find now, but an old cassette player with a large blob of glue on the play button and some Henry Brewis tapes got grandfather going with audio books. If you have a good local book shop the staff are usually helpful and will point you in the right direction.

Just had a thought, does things like Alexa read books on voice command?

 

[Mur Huwcun]

Have they got internet or can you sort internet? Then a smart speaker or two in the house

 

[som farmer]

help is out there, you just need to find it. F in Law even had a free pre-tour of Glastonbury, by mini bus. Not sure how much they could 'see', but he enjoyed it. The dementia, seems to affect his vision, the brain tells him, he can't see.

If l take him round the cattle, he soon tells me they look good, and the fields he used to farm, the reason, it takes his mind 'off' his brain telling him he can't see.

That's not saying he can see well, he can't, but there is a difference in what he can see, when his brain isn't telling him he can't, if you can understand that.

And the worrying bit, we could end up the same, in a few years time.

 

[som farmer]

Have they got internet or can you sort internet? Then a smart speaker or two in the house

he 'plays' with the internet, and gets in a right old muddle, basically because he can't see what he is doing !

What worries me with the internet, is being scammed, l was not so long ago, luckily realised, just in time, so lost nothing. Except they crashed my computer completely, and cannot get back on it, this is an old one.

That was 16 july, this last week, someone's had a good try to log into my pay pal account, l changed all the passwords, so failed, 8 requests to change p/word, appeared on my mobile. Co-incidence

But, nearly fooled me, very elderly ................ very scary, and a very real problem.

 

[David.]

This is probably not relevant, but a lorry driver was in here last week, who 2yrs ago was going blind, lost his Class 1, etc.
He was telling me that he saw all sorts of specialists and optometrists etc, to no avail, then one day someone he spoke to by chance had read something in America, about a patient with blindness caused by an extreme allergy to eating, or being in close proximity to cooking fish. The brain swells and compresses the optic nerves.
Bingo.
Two yrs on, he's in our yard collecting a load, albeit wearing driving glasses.
The body does weird stuff sometimes.

 

[Rich_ard]

Not sure you would get it if no Internet but loads on bbc sounds. Could be difficult if blind too I suppose.

 

[SilliamWhale]

Wasn’t sure where to post this so admins move if required please.
Dads 84, last 2 weeks been to and fro at hospital due to sudden sight loss in his good eye. He’s been partially sighted in the other for 44 years. About to lose his driving licence and can no longer read ( of which he does a lot ) so how can I access books that are spoken ? Im looking at Amazon Audible but my main concern is no internet or even tech savy. Mum still runs a Nokia 3310 for mobile to give you an idea.
Any experience of how to proceed would be welcome.

If you can get him into podcasts there is a lot out there. First step get Internet and then maybe a simple tablet

 

[Kidds]

Cousin was forever listening to books on an MP3 player, can you not download them from somewhere?
MP3 players are simple enough to use.

 

[JP1]

Contact RNIB they should be able to help with all sorts of things. I'm sure that you can get audio CDs by post for no charge if registered blind/partially sighted. Your local library might help as they should also have audio books and CDs which may be available to borrow free for people with a sight problem

Home

If you're affected by sight loss, we're here for you

www.rnib.org.uk

This. Grandfather had macular degeneration and they were amazing

 

[Dry Rot]

When the O.H was registered "partially sighted" , I'm not sure how it happened but we got a housecall from an RNIB worker - really helpful person who had a "goodie bag " with all kinds of aids for poor sight , all free , nothing too much trouble for her - lighted magnifying glasses, reading aids , and "much much more " . She kept in touch too !

There are good people out there. Sometimes it comes as a surprise as you get older! Been thinking about this lately and I think the most valuable asset is a sense of humour, especially a sense of the ridiculous! At the end of the day 'We're all Jock Tamson's Bairns' ("all the same").

 

[Kentishfarmer]

Wasn’t sure where to post this so admins move if required please.
Dads 84, last 2 weeks been to and fro at hospital due to sudden sight loss in his good eye. He’s been partially sighted in the other for 44 years. About to lose his driving licence and can no longer read ( of which he does a lot ) so how can I access books that are spoken ? Im looking at Amazon Audible but my main concern is no internet or even tech savy. Mum still runs a Nokia 3310 for mobile to give you an idea.
Any experience of how to proceed would be

When my Grandad started to go blind we set him up with Amazon Alexa. Once he got going on it, its great for them. It can play audio books just by telling it or, or radio or music etc. Helps a little withyhe loneliness older people experience both my grandparents would end up having conversations with it as it could tell them the weather, news etc. They would tell it things for the shopping list too which would be useful as they had usually forgotten what they wanted by the time it actually came round to going to the shops!

 

[Clive]

Wasn’t sure where to post this so admins move if required please.
Dads 84, last 2 weeks been to and fro at hospital due to sudden sight loss in his good eye. He’s been partially sighted in the other for 44 years. About to lose his driving licence and can no longer read ( of which he does a lot ) so how can I access books that are spoken ? Im looking at Amazon Audible but my main concern is no internet or even tech savy. Mum still runs a Nokia 3310 for mobile to give you an idea.
Any experience of how to proceed would be welcome.

Audible is very good, very simple/ user friendly and you can download books so even if internet isn’t great at listening location you can have them already on the device

set him up with Alexa / google home or siri and he will just be able to ask it to play / stop / adjust volume or find new content etc

 

[suffolksmallholder]

I think siri will connect to audible providing you do some of the groundwork.
Then voice commands and some head-phones or ear buds or a pair of speakers, and you are away.
Incapacitated in hospital last year this was a godsend!

Play Audible on HomePod Using Siri Command. The key to this solution is to transfer your Audible books to your iTunes Library. Once you do that, you can use the Siri command to play Audible audiobooks in your iTunes library on HomePod.

SS

 

[Will Wilson]

Local libraries still have audiobooks (cd's) or most have an APP (Norfolk's is called LIbby) this is like a free Audible and excellent!