How I fought for my career after becoming blind

Paul was pronounced legally blind at age 54, while working in a physically-demanding job in mining. Here’s how he kept his career going, and changed his office's attitude towards disability.

Nine years ago, in December 2013, I was sitting in my office at work and noticed a black spot in the corner of my right eye's vision.

Four hours later, half the vision in my eye was gone.

The next morning I found myself in hospital, about to have surgery to reattach my retina. After six weeks and multiple unsuccessful surgeries, I was blind in that eye.

I remember thinking to myself, ‘I’ll be OK, I still have good sight in my left eye.’ But six months later that retina suddenly tore in five places. Back to hospital.

After several months and many more rounds of surgery, I was pronounced legally blind in February 2015.

I was totally blind in one eye and had very low vision in the other. I was 54 years old, I was not ready to stop working or living my life.

At the time I was working as a product support engineer, doing retrofits and upgrades to heavy machinery; traveling around the world to remote mining sites.

I felt hopeless for days. I thought my life was over, and I had no clue how it was going to pan out from there. My wife and I had a great life, and all of a sudden, we were unsure what the future would hold.

So I came up with a plan. My first priority was to enable myself to continue working, so I contacted a low vision optometrist and he put me onto Guidedogs Queensland and Vision Australia, who sent out an orientation and mobility instructor to discuss my options.

Step One: enable myself to travel to work.

Step Two: learn how to read, write and use a computer and phone.

Step Three: approach my employer about returning to work.

The first few months were spent learning the basics of using a white cane to get around independently, which gave me a lot of confidence.

It took longer to learn how to use my computer and phone, many tedious months of touch typing while learning how to use screen reader software. I had to navigate my computer using only keystrokes - learning a new one for each and every function - and using voiceover on my phone.

But twelve months into my journey, I felt ready to return to work.

Paul was determined to return to work after he was pronounced legally blind.

I contacted my manager and HR team and, over many months, we worked together to modify my role. I negotiated a new position of Product Support Coordinator, a more administrative role, where I could issue work orders, mentor the team, and help process improvement projects.

I worked from home and returned to the office in March 2017. When I got back, it quickly became obvious that my presence created a lot of anxiety throughout the office. People who I had worked with for 11 years didn’t know how to cope with a person who was blind.

I felt like an alien. Some didn’t talk to me, some went overboard with trying to help me - we were all stressed. I needed to fix this problem.

So I arranged a training session for the entire office, led by myself and my orientation and mobility instructor, and we gave a presentation on vision loss.

We covered how to use a white cane, how to guide a person, and, most importantly, I explained to them that I was the same person I have always been, and asked them to treat me as they did before I lost my vision.

Instantly, the atmosphere in the office changed.

Everyone just relaxed. Colleagues started to leave a chair out for me in the same spot in meetings. Everyone would offer to get my lunch at our self-service counter. They just got it.

Paul says one information session helped change a lot of attitudes towards disability in his office.

One colleague sticks in my mind. He barely talked to me after I returned to the office, but soon after that training session he came into my office to thank me. He had been at the airport, and approached a woman who was vision impaired and asked if she needed help. He told me he'd never have done that before the training.

Today, I still work for the same company, and I’ve been promoted into a number of managerial roles. I even survived a company merger with one of our competitors. But I’m most proud of becoming an advocate for people with a disability in my workplace. I’ve created a Yammer group - an internal online work forum - where my colleagues with a disability share stories and tips with each other.

I have worked extremely hard and conquered many challenges to get my life back on track since 2015. It was hard at the start - there were so many times I'd had a gutful of it and just wanted to walk away. But someone's got to do it. And seeing the change of culture in my workplace - a company of 15,000 employees - makes me feel like it's been worth it. All the hard times were totally worth it.

Hear other stories of Australians determined to regain their lives after injuries and disabilities on Insight's 'Rebuilding Your Life' episode.