Family’s struggle with blindness

By Naftal Makori

It is 10am and Evans Kiriago Gesinya of Nyamemiso village in Nyamira County is seated with his three blind children outside their grass thatched house talking in low tones.

The children are clad in full uniform and bags behind their backs.

However, they cannot go to school because of the teachers’ strike that was called off recently.

Gesinya, who also became blind after an accident, has five children. Two of his four girls are blind and so is his only son.

Trail of misfortunes

“In 1995, while I was thatching my house, I accidentally fell off the ladder and my left eye was damaged. Subsequently, I started losing eyesight gradually,” he says.

“I can’t explain what happened. I could not see. It was total darkness,” he recalls.

He says problems in his family did not start recently. He recalls that between 1980 and 1990, his wife Teresa bore him five daughters, but they all died one after another under unexplainable circumstances.

“To date, I have never understood why they died, but I kept praying to God for protection of the remaining children,” says Gesinya.

He was later blessed with children, but his first three have turned blind and currently attend Kibos School for the Blind in Kisumu County.

“People say perhaps I am cursed. They suggest I go for remedy from fortune-tellers, but I want to remain faithful to God. I know that my state and that of my children can change,” says Gesinya.

Gesinya says his main challenge is to raise at least Sh80,000 annually for school fees and expenses for his children besides their daily upkeep.

“In my state, I do nothing that can sustain the basic needs of my family. It is only my wife and my younger children who can see,” he says.

The Gesinya’s predicament continues to baffle many residents, who wonder why his three children are blind.

His wife Teresa says the deaths of her first five children and the blindness of the three give her sleepless nights.

Ms Florence Moraa, a researcher who has worked with people with special needs says blindness can be hereditary or caused by other environmental conditions.

She says the children got constituency bursary funds once and appeals for wellwishers to step in.  

Meanwhile, the family hopes their misfortunes can one day be explained.

Experts’ take

Experts say childhood blindness affects the individual, their family, and the community. Blindness also has implications for infants’ development, education, and future social, marital, and economic prospects. Nearly 75 per cent of early learning comes from vision. Early onset visual loss can have profound consequences on a child’s emotional, and psychological development.

Some babies are born blind or with severe vision loss. This can be caused by many different things, including defects in the eye itself, problems with the part of the brain responsible for vision, or by infections. Some of the factors placing an infant, toddler, or child at significant risk for visual impairment include:Prematurity, low birth weight, oxygen at birth, or bleeding in the brain

People with albinism often have vision loss to the extent that many are legally blind, though few of them actually cannot see.