Blind Spot - Lifting Lives in Illness

Author: Richard M. Cohen (USA)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-12
Features: Disease is the shadow side of life, a more troublesome form of citizenship. Every person who enters the world possesses dual citizenship—one belonging to the Kingdom of Health, the other to the Kingdom of Illness. Although we are all inclined to use the passport of the Kingdom of Health, sooner or later, at least for a period of time, each of us will be forced to acknowledge that we are also citizens of the other Kingdom. "Blind Spot" is literally true, as the author is indeed a medically blind person, but more so, it is metaphorical. He shows us his own blind spot—the blindness, fear, anger, and tendency to turn a blind eye to everything when he unknowingly enters the Kingdom of Illness. At the same time, he also shows us our blind spot—a world we are unfamiliar with, the inner world of those who live in the Kingdom of Illness. To this Kingdom of Illness, outsiders are always curious, but when listening to patients' stories, most people have preset expectations: either expecting to hear lamentations and groans so they can shed tears and show sympathetic gazes, or expecting to hear a story of resilience, then exclaiming, "How difficult that must have been!" Whether it is sympathy or admiration, such expectations unintentionally draw an insurmountable divide between the two kingdoms—"They" and "We" are different—the subtext being: "They are the weak." And it is this divide that has prevented the residents of the Kingdom of Health from ever truly understanding the world of patients. When a healthy person inevitably steps into the Kingdom of Illness, they feel profound fear. Because they have never anticipated what kind of world illness brings. Beyond the physical harm inflicted by disease, they must also face the fear of others looking at them differently from then on. This is another layer of fear. This is our blind spot.