00:00Everything up here stopped developing.
00:02Like the eyeballs, eyelashes, eyebrows, none of that.
00:05I'm one out of two million.
00:06People have been mean, they're very judgmental.
00:09Do your kids do everything for you?
00:11Do you need a caregiver?
00:13If anything happens to our kid,
00:15everybody's making a big deal out of it.
00:16Oh, well, she doesn't know how to take care of her kid.
00:18You mentioned that someone called CPS on you.
00:20Do you want to tell us about that?
00:24My name's Adrian.
00:25I was born with a condition called
00:27Complete Bilateral Cryptophthalmous.
00:30Everything up here stopped developing.
00:33Like the eyeballs, eyelashes, eyebrows, none of that.
00:35I'm one out of two million.
00:37So it's very rare.
00:40I don't like to fry on an open stove.
00:43So I have an air fryer right here.
00:44It's safer.
00:45You don't have grease flying everywhere.
00:48It's really no different.
00:49Some things like she'll need more help than usual,
00:52but like usually when we were younger,
00:54she did everything herself.
00:55I've been a single parent by myself.
00:58I'm the type of person that I figure my own stuff out.
01:01Or I try every possibility before, you know, going for help.
01:06Where there's a will, I'm sure there's a way.
01:08When I was five, I asked to learn how to cook.
01:12So from there, you taught me how to cook different stuff.
01:17They're like, can I help you in the kitchen?
01:20I was like, well, I really don't want you nowhere near a stove.
01:23But as long as I'm in the kitchen, yeah, I guess you can help.
01:26My mother can do everything that I can do.
01:28She can't drive.
01:29She can clean up.
01:30She can cook.
01:31She can do things like that.
01:32I can't really compare her to anything else because she's the only mother I've had.
01:37At 19 years old, you felt pregnant.
01:39Tell us about that and how you felt.
01:40I came home for Christmas to visit my mother.
01:43She was just screaming and she's like, what are you going to do with the baby?
01:46I said, I'm going to raise it.
01:47Like, what do you mean?
01:48My dad wasn't too happy.
01:50He was like, well, you can't see to do this and this and that.
01:53When I had the baby, my middle brother, he asked me the question.
01:56Why don't you let mama raise the baby?
01:58I said, why don't you just leave?
02:02I carried this child for nine months and you mean to ask me?
02:05Why don't I let mama keep the baby and raise it?
02:07I was just like, dude, please get out of my face.
02:10Eventually, you know, people kind of just took it as it is what it is.
02:14My mom, God rest her soul, she helped out a lot.
02:17But sometimes I had to tell her to back off.
02:20I'm like, you can't, you can't take over my job.
02:22I'm sorry, that's not just going to work.
02:24And she understood that we've gotten into it.
02:27But she understood, hey, I need to do this for myself.
02:29It wasn't difficult.
02:30I know how to change, baby.
02:31I mean, yeah, parents get pooped on and peed on.
02:34And she did.
02:36Especially for blind parents who people underestimate a lot.
02:39Like society just doesn't give us that credit that we deserve.
02:42She was saying sentences by the time she was 16, 17 months old.
02:45She was putting on her shoes on the right feet by the time she was 15 months.
02:49Because I was teaching her that stuff early.
02:51Just kind of had to go for it.
02:52And trial and error will happen when it comes to your kids.
02:55You just got to decide which way are you going to, you know, do this to make it work.
03:00So that's what I did.
03:01Do you feel as if you missed out on anything with your daughters growing up?
03:05Just being able to see what they look like, I mean, it's not really a big thing to me.
03:09Because I pay attention to audio cues.
03:12You know, I knew their cries, the hungry cries, the bored cries, the I don't feel good cry.
03:17Or I'm just fighting my sleep, but sleepy cry.
03:20It was easy for me.
03:21It was really a struggle actually.
03:23Like sometimes people stare or give like weird looks.
03:27If you're curious, that's fine.
03:29But being like dirty looks and stuff, yeah.
03:31We try to stop that.
03:33When you are a blind parent, naturally you know we're a part of a minority.
03:37You know that the stigma is on us.
03:41This world is not nice.
03:43Even though I can't see, I do know what it's like.
03:45Because people have been mean.
03:47They're very judgmental.
03:48As blind parents, we have to be more protective than the sighted parents.
03:52Because if we get any calls or if anything happens to our kid, everybody's making a big deal out of
03:57it.
03:57Oh, well she doesn't know how to take care of her kid.
03:59Let's call CPS.
04:00Or, you know, make a hotline call.
04:02You mentioned that someone called CPS on you.
04:05It's just nosy neighbors.
04:06It's just people who are uneducated decide that they want to call.
04:10And my kids have never been taken away.
04:12Because I'm doing what I'm supposed to do.
04:14I told them, if you can raise my kids better,
04:17go ahead.
04:19They left.
04:20I still got my children.
04:22VOTE ON THE RECORD VIDEO BUTTON.
04:24Tilt left.
04:24Speech off.
04:26What's up y'all?
04:27This is your girl Sapphire.
04:29So, I need to do my facial care.
04:32My main purpose was to raise awareness about my eye condition.
04:35Because I don't know anyone that has it.
04:38So first of all, thank all of y'all.
04:40Y'all are helping and causing doors to open for me that I never thought possible.
04:46You know, why not put my story out there?
04:48Maybe one day I'll come across somebody who's like me.
04:50Keep rocking with me.
04:51Keep helping me grow up.
04:52I love y'all.
04:53But you better have thick skin when you do this social media thing.
04:56Because if you don't, honey, they will break you.
04:58Do your kids do everything for you?
05:01Do you need a caregiver?
05:03That's not safe.
05:04You shouldn't be walking around your house like that.
05:07Do you live with someone?
05:09What?
05:10People kind of get the wrong idea.
05:12Oh, I bet your kids take care of you.
05:15Huh?
05:15Take care of who?
05:16No.
05:17You got that wrong.
05:18Who took care of them then?
05:19There are people who know my capability.
05:22Who know my ability.
05:24And then there's the people who just assume.
05:26Maybe from an outside perspective, it kind of seems like that because I help my mom.
05:31But like, it don't be like, we take care of her.
05:33We don't do that.
05:34I don't have to like, walk her places.
05:36I don't have to take her places.
05:37She can go by herself.
05:39I obviously say something because that's my mother and I'm always on her side.
05:43But like, she takes her like, she doesn't even care.
05:45Like, she doesn't care what people say.
05:47Actually, somebody left that in my inbox.
05:49Tell us something.
05:49I know she can see, but I just can't prove it.
05:51I don't have a pic.
05:52I literally cursed them out.
05:53Literally.
05:54I said, I am not in the mood.
05:56Get off my page with that mess.
05:58Yeah.
05:59Sometimes I do clock back at them and I just be like, y'all need to go research.
06:05Stop assuming.
06:07Go educate yourselves.
06:10How about you open the book before you start judging by the cover?
06:13Read the chapters.
06:14You might like what you find.
06:16Honestly, like we're like any other family.
06:19We're no different.
06:20We have the same issues as you.
06:22I feel like having a visually impaired parent is really like taught me a lot of stuff.
06:28Honestly, I really love you.
06:30I love you too, mom.
06:32She know that.
06:33I just want people to know, with any disability, it's not about the difference.
06:38It's about how you're making that difference work.
06:41You just have to live the best way you know how and life is only what you make it.
06:45No matter what the challenges is, don't give up.
06:48Because guess what?
06:49If I can do it and others like me can do it, y'all can do it.
06:57My pain.
06:58Sorry.
06:59Me.
07:00others like me.
07:09You
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