Poor Vision Didn’t Keep Her Down

What she can do: Compete in the Wonder Woman Triathlon in Medical Lake, keep her class of fourth-graders at McDonald Elementary engaged and on task, supervise the busy schedules of her two teenagers. What she can’t do: Read a paperback, drive a car, see the top line on a standard eye exam chart. At age 16, Cindy Bergdahl was diagnosed with Stargardt disease, juvenile macular degeneration. “When I was 14, I started noticing I couldn’t see the chalkboard at school,” she recalled. “We lived in a remote town in Alaska with no eye doctors.” Her vision continued to decline and the Lions Club flew her to USC Medical Center where she received the grim diagnosis. Bergdahl said, “Counselors and vision specialists sat down and tried to tell me what my future would be. It floors me now to think how they told a teenager these devastating things”/ Cindy Hval , SR Washington Voices. More here. (J. Bart Rayniak’s SR photo of Cindy Bergdahl, a fourth-grade teacher at McDonald Elementary School.)

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Question: Has a member of your family overcome a physical disability to accomplish unexpected things?