A guide dog free zone

Thanks to all for your comments after my post about retiring my guide dog.

Right. Well I did it. He's gone. Liam finally retired. I am now without dog for the first time in 16 years.

I was petrified at the idea of giving him up. But, now he's gone, I am kind of beginning to appreciate not having a dog now. It's a nice break after 16 years not to have a knee high hairy golden shadow that needs feeding and putting out every few hours. It's now down to me and my trusty white cane.

so on my first day without, I turned up to work especially early. It's funny but having to use a cane feels slightly less dignified and makes me feel a little helpless. I don't think I used to feel like that when I was a full time cane user though. I know loads of people use them with no hassle and no wish to get a dog. I turned up early so no one would see me walking through reception and down the corridors in my new inanimate mobility aid world.

Tip tap, smash. Tip tap, smash. Actually I wasn't that bad ... I know the place so well that I could get by without barely using the cane at all. I imagine people think blind people use white canes in their own homes. Nah. If you live in a place and know it well, you don't need a cane. No self respecting blind person would use a cane to get from the lounge to the kitchen or vice versa. Similarly I could pretty much get by at work without a cane but there are so many people around that I think it's best to keep it in my hand and remind people I won't easily get out of their way if they charge towards me. Ladies and gentlemen, it's a health and safety concern.

Not much to say really other than I'm doing better than I thought. And have even had some mobility training around my home area. never thought I'd be able to find my way back home. With a dog it's a piece of piss - he knows which house is mine so will just walk up the front path to my door without me asking. With a white cane, well, it's two trees then find the hedge on the right. Cross the road at this point. Pass two skinny trees, three severe metal lamp posts that could really hurt ... and then find the big tree. Double back slightly and it's the second gate on the right.

You have to remember much more if you're a cane user. Not so good for a mid 30s fella who's definitely having classic thirty-something memory issues. Was that the second tree or the first? Not a matter of life or death but more a matter of home or someone elses's home.

My guide dog is about to retire

My guide dog Liam, who I've had for seven and a half years, will be retiring at the end of this week. He's now nine years old. Liam is a bit of a stressy sensitive dog so this seems the best time to retire him.

So, what does this mean. It means that Damon has to go back to using a white cane - something he hasn't done since leaving school in 1991.

Scared? Me?

Guide dogs make walking much quicker. They anticipate obstacles in front of you and correct your route before you bang into it, often without you even knowing. With a white cane, however, you don't know that an object is there until you whack into it. That's the main difference. Also white cains don't anticipate you might want to go into Sainsburys because you've been there so many times before! You have to really have your wits about you if you're a white cane user, concentration mode on high, be happy for journeys to take longer ... and of course it's much more of a physical and joint-aching experience sweeping that stick left to right constantly.

So. Liam retires. Might even be today I'm not sure. There are a couple of legal documents that the new owner, my friend Ewan, has to complete before we can 'do the transaction'.

But won't you get a new dog straight away, Damon?

Sadly not on this occasion. The waiting list is long and it seems my district team are over-stretched due to staff absence.

The positive thing here is that by relinquishing Liam, I am then classed as a Priority One. I am therefore much closer to the top of the list than had I been with dog. I didn't feel I could hold onto Liam much longer though because his sensitivity and stress is displaying quite a lot lately. He needs to retire and start a new life. A real unselfish move, eh? Well it's taken a while to come to this decision. I was about to give him up in April but then my friend Sara died and I just felt I didn't want to lose another big part of my life so soon. I feel like I'm jumping into a big deep dark hole.

When might you get a new dog then?

Good question. It may be around November time if I'm lucky. That leaves me 4 or 5 clear months without a dog. Possibly longer.

I expect my independence to dip and I forsee spending more time at home or my cash layout on taxis getting higher. All at a time when my fixed rate mortgage is about to end and go up in price by about 400 pounds a month. I am going to be so broke!

But it's little things, ya know, like leaving my desk at work ... just popping for a coffee. From this distance, today, it suddenly feels like a big chore with a cane. And, as I said earlier, you get none of that animal intuition from a cane - if I were to walk into the coffee bar at work, Liam would navigate me round people, misplaced chairs, tables etc, and take me directly to the counter where he knows I'm used to going to. And ya know, I'd barely even notice! With a cane, I'll have to bang into everything first before correcting my route. This could mean banging into a few people on the way too - moving obstacles as I like to think of them. But I'm sure my senses will sharpen up again and I'll start having to try and detect obstacles and people. Yes, blindies can do this - obstacle sense they call it. It's not as special as Channel 4 recently tried to make out in their superkid documentary, it's just about understanding the sound around you and the echoes. Layer of sound, muffling versus clearness, slight pressure on the eardrum when someone walks past and disrupts the sound path, etc. stuff like that. It's hard to put into words but it does feel like a sixth sense that you really only notice when you have to - i.e. when you go blind.

Anyhoo. Am not going to be unhappy about Liam retiring because he needs to and I'm pleased for him.

If any long term cane users want to post here and tell me I'm a total wimp then please do! :) There are loads of people who choose to stay with a white cane and would never go near a dog. In fact, the vast majority of blind people use canes over dogs. There is an art to it but I've lost that art. That's the issue today. Truth is that suddenly everything will be different again and I will need to readjust. Aaargggh!!!! Oh and there's also real potential to enter into a few undignified smash-ups with a cane, less regular than when you're using a dog, well, especially when starting out again. I'm sure I'll document them here with red face.