A deafblind girl from Hertfordshire who mastered braille at six-years-old with the extra challenge of losing her hearing calls for people to stop “assuming (she) can’t do things” as she is capable of far more than they realise. Emma Amos, 17, from Hertfordshire, was born with a visual disability but was not diagnosed until the age of two.
Doctors were eventually able to inform Emma’s mother Julie Amos, 43, a travel agent, that she suffered from cone-rod dystrophy and nystagmus, which is a rhythmical, repetitive, and unconditioned movement of the eyes. Emma’s eye sight reduction led the young lady to wear glasses every day with tinted lenses as she is sensitive to light, and she uses a long cane to help her walk.
According to her mother, Emma was unphased about her conditions but – as a defensive parent – she formerly dreaded the time when her daughter’s fully-sighted friends would say ‘let’s go to soft play’. Julie stated: “It was a complete and utter nightmare for me. I was on edge the whole time because she would just run around like a normal child but, obviously, she’d then bump into other children and other children would run into her.”
