THE TWO WORDS WHICH MADE THE DIFFERENCE.

I’ve just listened to a programme on forgiveness, where it comes from, what happens when it can’t be granted or achieved and what it means to those who can do so and, as with all such programmes, I found it interesting and moving especially since I have had to think about this many times during my own life.

Of course there is a difference between a wanton act of violence perpetrated against another or group of others by one or more individuals who are either fanatics or in gangs, and the accidental alteration made in someone’s life by someone trying to save it but knowing also that they can’t do so without damaging it.

Those of you who have read this blog will know that I am blind but not why. The reason is simple. I was born so premature – Ten weeks in fact – That I weighed no more than a bag of sugar looked like a skinned rabbit and had under developed lungs which meant I spent a considerable amount of time in an incubator, breathing high levels of oxygen designed to help me breathe more easily. This oxygen damaged my eyes to an irreparable extent by making the retinas become liked ridged cardboard rather like that found in chocolate boxes, thereby forcing them to detach. Probably the optic nerves were damaged or destroyed too as they may well have been burned. This practice was started in 1946 by a doctor who knew the consequences of the procedure but still it was done in order to save the lives of those involved and as a consequence many children born then and in the 1950’s and beyond were blinded thus. I have always known this is the cause – Even to the point where I was told that my Nan’s solicitor told her that my mother should sue for compensation which she refused to do for reasons of her own which I suspect I know but it’s not my place to say and anyway now she’s dead so what point would it serve? In my teens and beyond I bore a good deal of ill will and resentment both against her for not doing so since being blind is expensive since at least in the U.K help has to be paid for and paying someone else to drive me where I can’t easily go without riding in a car is ridiculously so. I was also angry that the plight of the Thalidomide victims was recognised while loads of people blinded as I was largely go unmentioned and uncompensated either financially or by being able to talk about what happened to us and even the medical profession prefer to say we were born blind or that it was because our eyes were under developed too which caused it despite their admission at the time that it was indeed the high oxygen levels that were to blame.

I never openly voiced my resentment but kept it to myself till some idiot said something like:

“Still it could be worse”

Or some medic said:

“Still we saved your life”.

Then I’d let fly at them, either asking them if they’d like to swap places or reeling off a stream of difficulties with all the vehemence I could muster. I realised that I’d become epileptic too as a result of the damage done by the oxygen although with medication designed to control the fits, taken on a daily basis, you could say I’m cured of it and now hardly know I have it.

What really angered me most was the dismissive way in which I was dealt with by doctors who asked the cause of my blindness and the casual way it was treated, rather as if they’d cut off my big toenail while trying to get a splinter out of my foot. They talked as if saving life was all, never mind whether that life was altered; career choices limited; even I believe at least in my case eligibility for marriage affected because as a woman I haven’t been seen as the ideal choice for a sighted man who hopes for a good mother for his children and a marriage partner or live-in partner who will share his life on equal terms. Then one day things changed. No my mother didn’t sue for compensation before she died. No I didn’t suddenly wake up and realise that there were thousands or maybe millions worse off because I already knew that since I’d been to school with some and heard about the others every time I didn’t want to eat my greens.

“Children in Africa or India would be glad of that”,

Would be the uttered statement before I was forced to comply by having them forced to the back of my throat on a fork in the blind school I attended, while my nose was being held. Instead, at the age of thirty-nine I moved to where I live now and met my present doctor.

“Why are you blind”?

He asked before my medical notes reached him from my former address.

“Here we go again”!

I thought and in one breath told him why, together with:

“Yes I know you (the medical profession that is) saved my life and yes I know it could have been worse since I could have been severely brain damaged. Yes I know all about it but ‘’’’’’”.

Gently he took hold of my hand and said the two words that maybe I was longing to hear, together with a few more:

“I’m sorry. That should never have happened”,

Uttered in a soft voice full of compassion and kindness which stopped me in my tracks.

I felt all the resentment and bitterness I’d often felt fall away. It dropped to the ground like a skirt taken off at the end of the day. I realised then that: “Sorry” was all I wanted; together with an acknowledgement that it wasn’t because I had under developed eyes or if I had then that wasn’t the sole reason for the problem. Many’s the time Nan told me about my Mum’s cousin who was wrapped in cotton wool and kept in the hearth in a shoe box and he’d been premature. They rubbed him in olive oil and he grew up strong and sighted. This lovely man whom I still see today as a patient allowed me to heal by acknowledging that this was an act of accidental and damaging destruction to a precious part of my body which most people regard as necessary in order to live even a half decent life. He accepted on behalf of the medical profession that something which shouldn’t have happened did especially since it was known about when it was being done. In fact the story goes that one nurse turned the oxygen levels down and another turned them up, thinking I wasn’t getting enough.

I could probably stand before the people who actually administered that oxygen without feeling all the bitterness and anger I used to feel towards them. There have been times when I could cheerfully have strangled them and would definitely have called them all the names I could think of if I’d met them but thanks to my doctor’s words the scab has healed over the wound on my psyche and I no longer pick at it. The fact that they didn’t mean to blind me meant nothing to me. I knew they knew that oxygen at those high levels did blind children because when Nan took me to a famous eye hospital they told her there was nothing they could do and why and what the cause was. Since there has been a documentary about it which is how I know the procedure began in 1946.

I’m forced to think from time to time about what would have happened had I not heard those words from my doctor and if I’d carried on feeling the deep hurt and anger I did feel. The only conclusion I can come to is that I’d have gone on causing further damage to myself – Not outwardly but inwardly. I wouldn’t have become sighted by bearing that resentment and it’s unlikely I’ll ever meet the people responsible so they’ll never know how I felt or the effect blindness has had on me. What I do know is that I am closer to my doctor as a result and trust him implicitly. I told him he’s the best doctor I’ve ever had and in his turn but on separate occasions he tells me he admires me for my courage, that he is a fan of mine and only last week he said:

“You’re a good lass”

Because I said:

“No”

To the questions:

“Do you smoke”?

And

“Do you drink”?

I waited for the sting in the tail as I left and he entreated me not to take it the wrong way but advised that I lose four pounds. I laughed and told him it’ll be more likely when I get my dog back.

I know now that another person’s acknowledgement of your hurt and what’s caused it, especially if they are connected with what has caused it, is probably vital in your struggle to forgive them. I also know that, as said before, there’s a difference between deliberate acts of malevolence and accidental harm but the pain from knowing you or yours have been injured, together with the consequences of each particular injury are no less traumatic or devastating for the victims. I also know that unresolved resentment, bitterness and anger is destructive and that in order to cope successfully with things as they are I have to make the most of what is left of an altered life. Yes there are days when I long to lay down the unrelenting burden of blindness and self-pity sticks its foot out for me to trip over into a slough of despond but I know too that only my arms can pull me out again when I fall in. What my doctor can never know is how the two little words:

“I’m sorry”

helped me also to lose the leaden weight of the anger, hatred, bitterness and resentment that threatened to anchor me there. Maybe he can come up with two words which will magically rid me of the four pounds he was on about! Who knows?