Speaker 1: I'll get at and welcome to another installment of the show.
Speaker 1: I hope you're bloody great. It's it's Monday. It's Monday Arvo.
Speaker 1: It's just hit the AVO. It's thirty three past the
Speaker 1: point where it becomes the ARVO. Tiffany and Cook and
Speaker 1: Matt are on the call. We'll get to mad in
Speaker 1: a moment. But the girl over there with the biceps
Speaker 1: who likes punching people in the face and was quite
Speaker 1: chuffed on the weekend because someone asked her if she
Speaker 1: was about to go in a bodybuilding show. So the ego,
Speaker 1: So the whole Dalai Lama thing, the whole kind of
Speaker 1: serenity humility thing from India, that's well and truly gone.
Speaker 2: Hey, I think it's the della alarmaed biceps. Like he'd
Speaker 2: give them a little flex as well. I reckon he
Speaker 2: give them a little flex.
Speaker 1: Imagine that if the Dellai Lama got on the fucking
Speaker 1: on the gear to get it on the gear, settle down.
Speaker 1: I didn't say you were anyone, but imagine if you
Speaker 1: got on and yeah, imagine. I don't think that's going
Speaker 1: to happen, though. I think he's a little bit more
Speaker 1: evolved than you and I. How are you, Tiffany? Very well?
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Has your Monday morning been?
Speaker 3: It's been good.
Speaker 2: Monday morning's always a busier morning with clients, but I
Speaker 2: had a little gap this morning, so I got to
Speaker 2: do a little bit of training, a little bit of
Speaker 2: fun training myself in between, and I like Mondays.
Speaker 3: They're busy, but they're good. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, good, that's good. What about you, Matt, how's
Speaker 1: your morning been? Sunshine?
Speaker 4: Yeah, a heartskit A. Tiffany, my morning's been great. It's
Speaker 4: sunny here in Horsham, so it's a hot one. Yeah,
Speaker 4: being busy, a couple of zoom calls this morning, but
Speaker 4: I actually had some time to go for a little
Speaker 4: walk before it heats up too much, so that was great.
Speaker 3: So no, loven't it? And just on the bysets, Tiffany.
Speaker 4: When I met you in person for the first time
Speaker 4: at the mine Ash Health goer, you know, I've got
Speaker 4: four percent vision in one life six percent of the
Speaker 4: other eye, and I could see your bysets, So yeah,
Speaker 4: you're kicking goals.
Speaker 1: I feel validated. Wow, wow, you do. So the guy
Speaker 1: who can hardly see has seen your biceps and been impressed.
Speaker 1: She'll be out of control all day. Now, mate, you
Speaker 1: shouldn't have told her that. Now.
Speaker 3: I saw a tiff, and I'm like, this is a
Speaker 3: woman you don't want to mess with.
Speaker 1: That is you're not totally wrong with that. But she
Speaker 1: can be either intimidating or a big basket case in
Speaker 1: the corner just sucking her thumb. I mean she alternates
Speaker 1: between those two.
Speaker 2: Well, that was that was a red carpet event, so
Speaker 2: I was I was very much the second option there.
Speaker 2: I was a bit out of my comfort zone.
Speaker 3: Yeah, did you wearing what did you well?
Speaker 1: What did both of you? I can't imagine. Sorry, man,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, like you're an impressive young man,
Speaker 1: but red carpet. What did you both? What did you
Speaker 1: both wear? Tiff? Did you have to rent something or
Speaker 1: did you look right in the back of the cupboard.
Speaker 3: I had to go out shopping.
Speaker 2: I bought myself a silky black jumpsuit, so it was
Speaker 2: you know, I mean, you can get away with a jumpsuit.
Speaker 2: I did have a mini breakdown about frocking up, so
Speaker 2: I met in the middle and I think I threw
Speaker 2: some red lippyon if I remember correctly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like a grown up. But what about you, Sunshine?
Speaker 1: Just a black suit, just like a straight up pumpin.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I went and bought it a new tux seed
Speaker 4: over myself, so I treated myself. I thought, Oh, first event,
Speaker 4: Crown Casino got to look the part. So no, I
Speaker 4: got the full tucks, the shiny shoes, the whole kittenkaboodle.
Speaker 3: I felt like I was at the brown Low Medal.
Speaker 3: So it was a great night.
Speaker 1: That's hilarious. Has anyone ever told you you'd be quite
Speaker 1: good on radio? You've got a good voice, Matt.
Speaker 4: I have been told I've had a great face for
Speaker 4: radio for many years, so who knows. I actually did
Speaker 4: a radio course with Vision Australia earlier this year, so
Speaker 4: that was really exciting. And yeah, jumped on a few
Speaker 4: podcasts over the years. Me and a mate used to
Speaker 4: do a podcast years ago, so I have done the
Speaker 4: speaking for quite a while.
Speaker 3: But yeah, I have heard that in.
Speaker 4: The past, for sure, but it's usually always been the
Speaker 4: term you've got a good face for radio.
Speaker 1: Tell them to fuck off. Man, you're a good look.
Speaker 1: I wish I wish I looked as good as you look, Sunshine.
Speaker 1: Don't worry, Oh so do we call you Matt, Mattie, Matthew,
Speaker 1: is it just Matt.
Speaker 4: Just call me Matt. Yeah, you can call me Matt.
Speaker 4: You can call me whatever. Really, but yeah, I do
Speaker 4: double trouble to tease, but yeah.
Speaker 1: Anything but late for dinner. You can call me. Tell
Speaker 1: us give my audience a little bit about the Matt
Speaker 1: de Gricci story, like just to give them an insight
Speaker 1: into who you are and a little bit of your backstory.
Speaker 4: Mate, Yeah, for sure, So get everyone. And my name
Speaker 4: is Matt Griucci. I'm currently twenty eight years of age
Speaker 4: and I am a blindness and disability advocate. I also
Speaker 4: do some subcontracts consulting with lived experience experts, so that's
Speaker 4: really exciting and it's all in the disability and inclusion space.
Speaker 4: But how I got there was when I was about
Speaker 4: six to seven. It was probably just in the early
Speaker 4: ages of grade three grade four at school. My parents
Speaker 4: first started noticing I was bringing my school work back
Speaker 4: home and I didn't complete it in class. So I
Speaker 4: wasn't completing my assignments in class, and I also was
Speaker 4: looking a lot closer.
Speaker 3: At it than what my peers were.
Speaker 4: So that was met with a little bit of skepticism,
Speaker 4: but we went to some appointments. I was given bifocal glasses,
Speaker 4: misdiagnosed with dyslexia, you name it.
Speaker 3: I had the work.
Speaker 4: So this went on for probably about the best part
Speaker 4: of two years, maybe around eight a months.
Speaker 3: And this was lots of different appointments.
Speaker 4: So in a nutshell of the disease that I have
Speaker 4: is Stargarts, which I'll get to in a sec but
Speaker 4: at the time when I was diagnosed, it was quite
Speaker 4: hard for the standard optometrists just to have a look
Speaker 4: in the back of someone's eye and go, okay, that's
Speaker 4: Stargart's disease. So it was quite hard to sort of pinpoint.
Speaker 4: So that's where I had a few misdiagnosises. But anyway,
Speaker 4: going on, about a few months later, we went to
Speaker 4: this appointment and there was this optometrist and he goes, nah, nah,
Speaker 4: I reckon, you're just faking it.
Speaker 3: You're a bit of an attention seeker.
Speaker 4: Wouldn't really take me seriously, didn't want to do a
Speaker 4: half assed test in his opinion.
Speaker 3: I don't know where he got that from.
Speaker 4: And yeah, he turned and he looked at my mum
Speaker 4: and he said, well, if your son can't read this.
Speaker 4: He must be a retarde. When I was about eight
Speaker 4: years old and I've just been labeled there a retide
Speaker 4: by someone that you kind of look up to, someone
Speaker 4: that's going to help you and you fix this vision.
Speaker 4: Because at the time, I kind of thought, yeah, i'd
Speaker 4: have a few appointments, I'll get this eye problem sorted out,
Speaker 4: and then I'll go about my way.
Speaker 3: I'll keep watching the Simpsons, I'll keep living me life.
Speaker 4: I didn't really actually think that there would be any
Speaker 4: weight to what would actually happen in the future, so
Speaker 4: that was a pretty confronting experience.
Speaker 3: But I still hadn't had my diagnosis yet. And then
Speaker 3: I did.
Speaker 4: Meet a lovely fresh Outer University ophthalmologist. She had just
Speaker 4: studied Stargarts disease, which is the disease that I have.
Speaker 3: So that is.
Speaker 4: How I actually found or got my diagnosis. I went
Speaker 4: to an optometrist and she found the yellow like flaky
Speaker 4: specks in the back of my eye, which is a
Speaker 4: build up of vitamin A. So, in very simple terms,
Speaker 4: my Stargarts disease is affected by the build up of
Speaker 4: vitamin A. So I'm sure we've all heard over the
Speaker 4: years the expression eat your carrots that are really good
Speaker 4: for your eyes. I'm sure we've all heard that one. Well,
Speaker 4: actually not in my situation. So my eyes can't break
Speaker 4: down vitamin A that builds up it turns into this
Speaker 4: yellow like bugger substance in the back of my eye
Speaker 4: and that's what kills off the cells. But anyway, got
Speaker 4: the diagnosis eventually, and it was really like at that
Speaker 4: time a switch turning off. That's when the visual degeneration
Speaker 4: started to happen quite rapidly. And I really did shut
Speaker 4: down because I saw around me in the very early
Speaker 4: days when I did go to a few different excursions
Speaker 4: and experiences that were meant to kind of get you
Speaker 4: prepared for losing vision, and I noticed there was this
Speaker 4: bubble wrap or a gold star approach. It was kind
Speaker 4: of like, oh, here's your gold staff for participation, but
Speaker 4: not really getting the real go at things. And that
Speaker 4: really scared me because I just wanted to have a
Speaker 4: normal crack at things. I just wanted to do what
Speaker 4: I wanted to do and not sort of be sugarcoated.
Speaker 4: So I actually, yeah, really doubled down and hid my disabilities.
Speaker 4: So throughout my school schooling years up until the age
Speaker 4: of probably sixteen, when I couldn't really hide on disability anymore.
Speaker 4: It was the age where everyone's getting their license, getting
Speaker 4: a taste of.
Speaker 3: That freedom and go and driving.
Speaker 4: And here I was, and people are asking me, well,
Speaker 4: why don't you have your l plates matter? Why aren't
Speaker 4: you doing this? And initially I'm not ashamed and saying it.
Speaker 4: Initially I would actually just make up white lives. I'd
Speaker 4: just say, oh, I just haven't got men l plates yet,
Speaker 4: or I just haven't done it yet, or you know,
Speaker 4: I'll get there eventually. But it all stemmed from shame,
Speaker 4: Like I felt really guilty and shameful for having something
Speaker 4: qute wrong with me that I didn't actually put on myself.
Speaker 3: But that's how I felt at the time.
Speaker 4: I really had this victim mindset that I was a
Speaker 4: bad person, having something wrong with me that was never
Speaker 4: my first, like my choice in the beginning in the
Speaker 4: first place. And that was really my mindset. Really was
Speaker 4: like a light's on, but no one's home kind.
Speaker 3: Of deal, and it really was. It was sugarcoated, it
Speaker 3: was the bubble wrap.
Speaker 4: It was all that sort of stereotypical stuff that really
Speaker 4: scared me.
Speaker 3: And yeah, it shut down.
Speaker 4: It was kind of like the I guess in a way,
Speaker 4: it's like the five stages of grief, like get into
Speaker 4: the acceptance of my blindness, because early on I was
Speaker 4: very very much in denial, so I would not believe
Speaker 4: that I was going blind.
Speaker 3: And you know, I would pick up a can of
Speaker 3: you know, I could.
Speaker 4: Be a can of soft drink, or it could be
Speaker 4: a bottle of water, and I would turn it over
Speaker 4: to the back of the label, and I would really
Speaker 4: strain my eyes, almost to the point where I'd give
Speaker 4: myself a migrain and like tears in my eyes. I
Speaker 4: would strain that much. And it was kind of to
Speaker 4: trick myself into thinking that if I could strain enough
Speaker 4: and be able to see one of the words, oh, yep,
Speaker 4: I'm fine, I don't have Stargut's disease, and then this
Speaker 4: big bad dream would be over. That's how my brain
Speaker 4: functioned at the time. So I went through the denial
Speaker 4: and then you know, obviously you kind of realize, wow,
Speaker 4: I am still losing my vision, Like this isn't going away.
Speaker 3: So you go through, you.
Speaker 4: Know, the angry stage, really angry and resentful and feel
Speaker 4: like the woe is me? This happened to me, this
Speaker 4: is so unfair, and then you kind of, you know,
Speaker 4: you do go into the bargaining stage where you kind
Speaker 4: of try and like trick yourself and you're like, Okay, well,
Speaker 4: if I do this, then I'm still independent, or if
Speaker 4: I do that, and then I would kind of then
Speaker 4: actually not ask for the supports that I needed. So
Speaker 4: in turn, it still made me struggle a bit because
Speaker 4: I couldn't actually absorb or take in the information on
Speaker 4: the whiteboard or the blackboard at school. And that was
Speaker 4: so bad that even a teacher on my last day
Speaker 4: of school didn't even know that I was legally blind
Speaker 4: and losing my vision.
Speaker 3: That's how good I wasn't hiding my disability.
Speaker 4: So I got through all those stages very very poor
Speaker 4: mental health.
Speaker 3: So it actually led us to it.
Speaker 4: It was a family style intervention that around the age
Speaker 4: of yeah, getting your license.
Speaker 3: Saying a load of freedom.
Speaker 4: I was really a shell of the person that I
Speaker 4: was as a kid, and yeah, it was a family
Speaker 4: style intervention. I got the canceling sessions. I think I
Speaker 4: got ten free canceling sessions that was at the time,
Speaker 4: which you could get through your GP. And honestly that
Speaker 4: it was such a shift in mindset. One of the
Speaker 4: things I remember from that time, and it's funny because
Speaker 4: I don't actually drive a car, but my cancelor got
Speaker 4: me to draw a picture of me in the driver's
Speaker 4: seat taking the power back the steering wheel and taking
Speaker 4: control of my own life and what I.
Speaker 3: Wanted to do. And it was all a metaphor, but
Speaker 3: it was so powerful.
Speaker 4: And I actually even got back into drawing because that
Speaker 4: was a skill that I guess I hadn't lost. I
Speaker 4: was still quite artistic and creative, but I just stopped
Speaker 4: doing it once I started to lose my vision because yeah,
Speaker 4: prior to diagnosis, as a youngster, very very very active,
Speaker 4: very creative, arts and crafts, all that stuff, and I
Speaker 4: really shut down and just stopped doing all of the
Speaker 4: things that I enjoyed as in my teenage years. So
Speaker 4: getting to that step of acceptance was probably the biggest
Speaker 4: thing for me, being able to accept my disability, because
Speaker 4: then that gave me the power to not have the fear,
Speaker 4: not have the anxiety of thinking almost holding onto that
Speaker 4: hope of a cure, because that really was the thing
Speaker 4: that yet shut me down. I would google Stargart's disease.
Speaker 4: I would be google and research and it was all
Speaker 4: with the sort of mindset of denial. It was me
Speaker 4: wanting to get rid of this so then I could
Speaker 4: go back to living my old life, rather than just
Speaker 4: accepting it and being like, Okay, this is a deck
Speaker 4: of cars. I've gotten life, and this is what I
Speaker 4: want to do with it. So yeah, in a nutshell
Speaker 4: getting myself to a place like that. I've started to
Speaker 4: share my story. I do keynote presentations at schools and
Speaker 4: stuff like that, and it's all happened pretty unconsciously because
Speaker 4: I never thought I would ever do speaking.
Speaker 3: I never thought that. I never put myself out there
Speaker 3: like that. It was actually a.
Speaker 4: Teacher in it might have been year eleven at school
Speaker 4: and we were doing a high school musical and he goes,
Speaker 4: you need to be the MC in this musical. You
Speaker 4: need to be the disc jockey, and I pushed back.
Speaker 4: I didn't want to do it. I remember, right up
Speaker 4: to the last training sessions before we went live with
Speaker 4: the musical, I even was full of anxiety.
Speaker 3: I hadn't really learned my lines and stuff.
Speaker 4: But I went ahead and I did the musical and
Speaker 4: I did really well, and I thought, oh wow, I
Speaker 4: might be able to do a bit of speaking. And
Speaker 4: then this was still when I hadn't told anyone about
Speaker 4: my blindness. No one knew accept me initial family and
Speaker 4: made him best made Ben. Apart from that, yeah, no one,
Speaker 4: So kept going on with that, and then it was
Speaker 4: actually Foundation Fighting Blindness that reached out wanted me to
Speaker 4: make a short video. I did it, not really thinking
Speaker 4: that it would have the impact that it did at
Speaker 4: the time.
Speaker 3: So this has going back quite a few years ago.
Speaker 3: This is before TikTok.
Speaker 4: This is back in the blog post days of the
Speaker 4: early Facebook. So at the time I did a video
Speaker 4: for the how You See a campaign where I explained
Speaker 4: my condition, just the little tips and tricks that I'm
Speaker 4: using in my life to get by, and it kind
Speaker 4: of went viral at the time or for what it was.
Speaker 4: And yeah, before I knew it, I was going over
Speaker 4: to America and meeting the two blind brothers who also
Speaker 4: have Stargarts disease, which was awesome because apart from meeting
Speaker 4: one other person in Australia the Stargarts and my sister
Speaker 4: who has been diagnosed in recent years, I haven't actually.
Speaker 3: Met too many people with the same disease that I've got.
Speaker 4: So to go over there and meet two people that
Speaker 4: I look up to, that you know, have just kicked
Speaker 4: goals in life. They've been on the Ellen DeGeneres Show,
Speaker 4: and now you know, I'm doing a presentation sort of
Speaker 4: thing alongside them. That was an incredible experience and it
Speaker 4: really launched what I do now. So MDV that's what
Speaker 4: I do now, that's my brand. It's Matt de Bridge
Speaker 4: Vision and we hyphenated it. And it started out just
Speaker 4: as a blog post.
Speaker 3: I was on the way.
Speaker 4: I was on the way to an ac DC concert
Speaker 4: back in twenty sixteen, and I was still working at
Speaker 4: a retail shop at that time. So I'd worked in
Speaker 4: retail for about ten years. So I never let my
Speaker 4: blinder stop me. I was always working, I was always hustling.
Speaker 4: But I just wanted something more. I didn't want to
Speaker 4: just be, you know, to check out chicks, so to speak.
Speaker 4: I wanted to do something more and real, non tokenistic,
Speaker 4: disability and inclusion training is my vibe, that's my niche.
Speaker 4: So that's the direction that I headed in. And yeah,
Speaker 4: it started off as a clothing brand. It really did,
Speaker 4: selling a few T shirts and you know, I would
Speaker 4: pack all the orders up, and before I knew it, it
Speaker 4: did start a little bit of a movement. I started
Speaker 4: the campaign what makes You Visionary coincided with the ability
Speaker 4: not disability, and everything centered around Yeah, taking the power
Speaker 4: back and the focus away from putting all that energy
Speaker 4: onto a disability and instead focusing on ability.
Speaker 3: Because that's where I've achieved the best.
Speaker 4: Things in my life is when I haven't really focused
Speaker 4: about my blindness. I don't wake up in the morning
Speaker 4: and think, oh wow, I'm blind or I can't see,
Speaker 4: and yeah, I might bump into a wall or make
Speaker 4: my morning cup of coffee with orange juice instead of milk.
Speaker 4: But like, I still go, I do that quite often.
Speaker 4: I do that more than I'd like to admit, I'll
Speaker 4: tell you. But yeah, that's where the biggest achievements have
Speaker 4: happened in my life is not yet not living my
Speaker 4: life conducted by the thought and the label of oh
Speaker 4: I'm disabled or I'm blind, and it's all focused on
Speaker 4: yet the ability. And that's not to say that it
Speaker 4: takes away from equity, Like we all need the supports
Speaker 4: to be able to thrive in life. It's not to
Speaker 4: take away from anything because I still use heaps of technology.
Speaker 4: I'd be lost without it. I use triple tag zoom
Speaker 4: on any computer device. I use screen readers. I've recently
Speaker 4: partnered with a company in the US called Iris Vision,
Speaker 4: and they do headset technology with screens really close to
Speaker 4: your eyes. And because it's so close to my eyeballs,
Speaker 4: I can actually see quite well. So I use technology.
Speaker 4: I use so many devices so I can be able
Speaker 4: to do the things that.
Speaker 3: My peers do.
Speaker 4: But yeah, it's all with a focus on ability, and
Speaker 4: you get that, you get the job done. So in
Speaker 4: a nutshell, a very drawn out nutshell, that's sort of
Speaker 4: what I do.
Speaker 1: I don't think you know what. I don't think you
Speaker 1: know what a fucking nutshell is. Mane, let's be honest.
Speaker 1: But no, that's amazing, that's amazing, No, honestly, all silliness. Guide.
Speaker 1: You're an inspiration. It's great, it's great.
Speaker 4: And then yeah, I had the privilege of meeting Tiffany
Speaker 4: back in May, so that's been fantastic.
Speaker 2: Got to be the highlight, doesn't it.
Speaker 3: Oh, definitely one of them for sure. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well mate, well mate, you are indeed in inspiration. All right,
Speaker 1: let me circle back and ask you a few things.
Speaker 1: Thank you for that synopsis that overview that It was
Speaker 1: great though, because I love it when I can sit
Speaker 1: back and somebody can just share their story very, very
Speaker 1: efficiently and effectively. All right, So tell me about tell
Speaker 1: me about the intervention. So like when we think of interventions,
Speaker 1: we often think of somebody who's struggling with addiction and
Speaker 1: the family comes in and goes, listen, Champ, this is
Speaker 1: not working. You need to get your shit together, or
Speaker 1: we need to get you in rehab or some kind
Speaker 1: of therapy. What tell me about the intervention. What led
Speaker 1: your family to do that, What was happening, and how
Speaker 1: did you feel about that and respond to that, and
Speaker 1: what did the intervention. I mean, you told us a
Speaker 1: bit about sessions, but tell us about that point in time.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 4: So the reason that started it is my mental health
Speaker 4: was just bottom of the barrel. It was full depression,
Speaker 4: full anxiety, and probably also OCD mixed in with that.
Speaker 4: So I was very anxious and just very depressed. And
Speaker 4: I also really turned to food at that time as
Speaker 4: a copy mechanism. I really sort of ate myself almost
Speaker 4: towards an early grave. So at the time when the
Speaker 4: family intervention style thing did happen. I was almost one
Speaker 4: hundred and fifty kilos. In fact, i'd stopped buying myself
Speaker 4: because the scale.
Speaker 3: Wouldn't even weigh me. So that's something I'm quite proud of.
Speaker 4: Over recent years, I've really changed my lifestyle in health ways, because, yeah,
Speaker 4: throughout my teenage years I was very morbally obese, and
Speaker 4: at that point I was just I was very sick.
Speaker 4: I was living on three different pills a day just
Speaker 4: to slow down my heart rate. So that's pretty scary
Speaker 4: to be, you know, eighteen years old or seventeen years
Speaker 4: old and to be on three medications just to slow
Speaker 4: your heartbeat. Was also taking i think two medications at
Speaker 4: the time for blood pressure, which is just not a
Speaker 4: life to be living. So I was incredibly anxious. I
Speaker 4: was incredibly depressed, and the sort of well is me
Speaker 4: mentality about my blindness, and then I guess, yeah, the comfort.
Speaker 4: The comfort for that was the food, so it was
Speaker 4: the overeating. So it was a combination of so many things.
Speaker 4: It was definitely, yeah, some health struggles and definitely mental health.
Speaker 4: But the conversation initially looked like a conversation around the
Speaker 4: dinner table and of course, when you know my parents,
Speaker 4: When my family voiced their concerns and they wanted the
Speaker 4: best for me, of course I pushed back. I didn't
Speaker 4: want to have the call with the cancer. I didn't
Speaker 4: want to you know, I'm fine all this and that
Speaker 4: everyone else is the issue. I'm not the problem. Everyone
Speaker 4: else is the issue. That's very much how I saw it.
Speaker 4: But anyway, I did persevere, and it wasn't It wasn't
Speaker 4: straight away. It probably took me three or four weeks
Speaker 4: of me pushing back and then maybe letting them in
Speaker 4: a little bit, and then pushing back a little bit more.
Speaker 4: But actually I did go to my first appointment, and
Speaker 4: quite instantly I did feel very comfortable with the counselor.
Speaker 4: She's an amazing woman, and even to this day I
Speaker 4: still do have conversations and catch up, so probably more
Speaker 4: so as a friend now and sort of the similar
Speaker 4: fields and careers that we were in, but definitely an
Speaker 4: incredible experience and the ten free sessions that worked out,
Speaker 4: and I definitely I couldn't recommend it more.
Speaker 3: If it's still a thing that is.
Speaker 4: Offered to people, it really just allowed me to unpack
Speaker 4: some of the mindset shifts so you know, I didn't
Speaker 4: have the knowledge or the skills to even understand that
Speaker 4: some of the reasons I was acting was because of
Speaker 4: my anxiety or maybe some of the thoughts and the
Speaker 4: opinions that I had for possibly even being called a
Speaker 4: retard or the four eyes or being bullied in school. Like,
Speaker 4: there were so many different things that I didn't even
Speaker 4: have knowledge or ways to unpack.
Speaker 3: So being able to.
Speaker 4: Sit there and go, hmm, I don't actually have to
Speaker 4: believe that, I don't have to assign meaning to that thought.
Speaker 3: I can just let it pass.
Speaker 4: Go about my dad because I guess, yeah, definitely definitely.
Speaker 4: Back in my early teenage years and leading up to
Speaker 4: my crisis, essentially I would get latched on to every
Speaker 4: thought and it would snowball and I would Yeah, I
Speaker 4: was a hypochondriact. I was always concerned that I was
Speaker 4: dying too. Yeah. I would always tell myself that I
Speaker 4: was dying of lakemia, dying of a brain shreamer.
Speaker 3: There were so many things that it.
Speaker 4: Was really bad, that was so bad that I actually
Speaker 4: there was one day I just had a little bit
Speaker 4: of dirt on my arm. Now, obviously I do have
Speaker 4: low vision too, so I might not seeing it as much.
Speaker 4: But I went up to someone and I was like,
Speaker 4: look at this bruise on my arm. I've got cancer.
Speaker 4: I'm gonna die. Like that's how hysterical I was. And
Speaker 4: someone just white the.
Speaker 3: Dirt off my arm and they go, Matt, that's dirt.
Speaker 4: So I was really, like I said earlier, it was
Speaker 4: really like lights were.
Speaker 3: On but no one was home.
Speaker 4: Like I was just on autopilot of fight and flight
Speaker 4: mode for sure.
Speaker 1: That Matt, do you think thank you? Do you think that?
Speaker 1: Because like you're a fucking maye in communicator dude, Like
Speaker 1: I'm sure you've been told that, and yeah, you can
Speaker 1: talk well and you've got a good voice.
Speaker 4: But.
Speaker 1: Your ability and I'm sure you've you've refined it over time.
Speaker 1: But for a twenty eight year old navigating the world
Speaker 1: with a disability and doing what you do and also
Speaker 1: with lots of great abilities on top of your one disability,
Speaker 1: but like you're an amazing communicator and share of thoughts
Speaker 1: and ideas and storyteller. Do you think the fact that
Speaker 1: your vision is so limited that all your other senses
Speaker 1: and skills have kind of become better than Like I'm thinking,
Speaker 1: I wonder if this bloke could see normally, if it'd
Speaker 1: be such a great communicator because you have to rely
Speaker 1: so much on listening, whereas we can. I always say
Speaker 1: to people, and this is an indictment on me, I say,
Speaker 1: pay attention to a little bit of what people say
Speaker 1: and all of what they do. You know, like, I'm
Speaker 1: more interested in what I see than what I hear sometimes,
Speaker 1: But you don't have that luxury. I feel like the
Speaker 1: fact that you can't see what TIF and I and
Speaker 1: most of our listeners can see. You've had developed this
Speaker 1: like almost auditory superpower where you can here but also
Speaker 1: see with your ears, if you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: No, I one hundred percent.
Speaker 4: And I love that you said that, because, in all honesty,
Speaker 4: if I did have twenty twenty vision, I don't think
Speaker 4: I would be as an effective as a communicator. I
Speaker 4: don't even think I would be doing anything in the
Speaker 4: sort of what I'm doing right now. So I actually
Speaker 4: love that I've got Stargus's disease. I think it makes
Speaker 4: me the person that I am today. I would never
Speaker 4: change it for the world. So that's definitely a contrast
Speaker 4: to years and years ago, for sure. But as although
Speaker 4: it does, it is meant to be a myth on
Speaker 4: paper that you know, any other sense is enhanced because
Speaker 4: you lose one. But for the people that I've spoken
Speaker 4: to and from my own experience, I do think that
Speaker 4: it is true. Like I definitely pick up on energy
Speaker 4: so much more than I get I think other people do.
Speaker 4: Like so when I walk into a room or if
Speaker 4: I'm doing a presentation, I'm not seeing the facial expressions,
Speaker 4: I'm not seeing the audience, so I'm picking up on
Speaker 4: vibe ships and then I'm thinking, Okay, well this is
Speaker 4: where I need to go with my story or this
Speaker 4: is where I need to go now. So I'm a
Speaker 4: big believer, and people will forget what you said, people
Speaker 4: will forget what you tell them, but they'll never forget
Speaker 4: how you made them feel. So I'm a big believer
Speaker 4: in that, and I guess as far as the communication goes,
Speaker 4: it would be Yeah, me ten thousand hours.
Speaker 3: I'm a big believer in that.
Speaker 4: You've got a craft that put your ten thousand hours in.
Speaker 4: I've been doing this since twenty sixteen, probably on a
Speaker 4: professional scale since twenty twenty. So yeah, working towards you
Speaker 4: always got more to learn. I will never ever leave
Speaker 4: a talk or I'll never have a conversation with someone
Speaker 4: and think, oh wow, I nailed that. If anything, I'm
Speaker 4: always going through and thinking how can I make that better?
Speaker 3: Or how can I learn more with that? Like I'm
Speaker 3: always wanted to get better.
Speaker 4: I never sit back and think, oh, yeah, that was
Speaker 4: bloody awesome. So I feel like that's a good quality
Speaker 4: to have, probably as well, because I'm always thinking and
Speaker 4: I'm maybe not like, not that great, so then I'm
Speaker 4: trying to even become better, which is a good still skill.
Speaker 4: But yeah, definitely, I definitely have what's it cold when
Speaker 4: it's hearing, but you can kind of hear what you
Speaker 4: want to not hear. There's a word for its, selective hearing.
Speaker 4: Good one tip. Yeah, I definitely have selective hearing. Don't
Speaker 4: get me wrong, but I can definitely hear conversations that
Speaker 4: happening in other rooms where other people would just go.
Speaker 3: Completely off the top of their head.
Speaker 4: A few years ago, I was actually on a trip
Speaker 4: with a bunch of friends and I could just yeah,
Speaker 4: hear the conversation in the other room and I just
Speaker 4: made a funny joke and they were blown away to.
Speaker 3: Think that, how did you hear that?
Speaker 4: Are you like ears drop and I'm like, no, honestly,
Speaker 4: I'm just sitting here, but I can hear it. And
Speaker 4: I just think that's because I'm not giving much energy
Speaker 4: to my eyes. I really it's hard to explain because
Speaker 4: people do think I still really use my vision and
Speaker 4: what I can see, but a lot of the time
Speaker 4: I am so on autopilot. We're just getting from A
Speaker 4: to B, and I kind of know my bearings and
Speaker 4: I really do switch my eyes off. I'm not really
Speaker 4: paying much attention to anything that's coming through, and it is.
Speaker 3: It's all on sound and vibes, honestly, sound and energy.
Speaker 1: I think also, like you said that, maybe technically your
Speaker 1: hearing doesn't get literally better, but I think what you
Speaker 1: do with your hearing changes because you're not distracted by
Speaker 1: seeing shits that like you are hanging. It's like if
Speaker 1: I go I had this epiphany a few years ago, mate,
Speaker 1: because I sit in front of a lot of people
Speaker 1: and talk to a lot of people, and I realized that,
Speaker 1: you know, there's a difference between being a good talker
Speaker 1: and a great communicator. Right, A lot of people can talk,
Speaker 1: but they're terrible at connection and communication and creating a
Speaker 1: great interpersonal experience, and I realized that I wasn't terrible
Speaker 1: at my job, but I don't think I was great,
Speaker 1: And I probably over talked a little bit, like I
Speaker 1: think for me, if I'm coaching someone, if I'm one
Speaker 1: on one, it sull be about ten percent me ninety
Speaker 1: percent them in terms of the talk time, right, but
Speaker 1: it was probably more like thirty seventy, so too much.
Speaker 1: But also I realized that I wasn't always fully present.
Speaker 1: And I can't remember what precipitated it, but I had
Speaker 1: this moment where I went, how I'm become going to
Speaker 1: become much better at this is by you know, when
Speaker 1: that hour starts or whatever the session is. You know,
Speaker 1: it's like done over two thousand podcasts, right with this
Speaker 1: show and some other shows that I did.
Speaker 4: It's amazing effort, your kicking goals, many thanks.
Speaker 1: Man, thanks, but just being able to go all right,
Speaker 1: and I'm talking with Matt at twelve thirty, and at
Speaker 1: twelve thirty, I'm fully present. I'm not looking at my phone,
Speaker 1: I'm not thinking about other things. I'm not distracted like
Speaker 1: you do your twelve or fifteen minute monologue at the start,
Speaker 1: which I fucking loved, but I'm fully present, I'm writing notes,
Speaker 1: I'm listening. And I think when you whatever it is,
Speaker 1: whether it's with your hearing or your vision or some
Speaker 1: other sense, but.
Speaker 5: You you can kind of fine tune that, you can
Speaker 5: develop that and you block out the shit that you
Speaker 5: don't need to hear or pay attention to, and then
Speaker 5: like really focus and even though you're technically you're hearing
Speaker 5: is not better, but you're actually hearing a lot more.
Speaker 1: Because of what you're paying attention to. Is that right?
Speaker 1: Or is that in the ballpark?
Speaker 4: No, that's one hundred percent right, harps. And Also I'd
Speaker 4: like to elaborate that when I'm listening to people talking, right,
Speaker 4: rather than my eyes catching the visual cues, I'm actually appy.
Speaker 4: So if anything, rather than using my eyes, I'm also
Speaker 4: painting a picture to make the story that that individual
Speaker 4: is telling me even clearer. So I do think I
Speaker 4: sort of subconsciously extremely actively listen and I am painting
Speaker 4: the picture of the sort of missing pieces of that puzzle.
Speaker 3: So in my brain.
Speaker 4: But because yeah, I definitely believe when I am in
Speaker 4: a lot of situations, I'm just there. I'm in the room,
Speaker 4: I'm with the person. I'm not really seeing too much,
Speaker 4: and for what I can see, it's nothing to really
Speaker 4: even yeah, because it's so blurry, I'm not really going
Speaker 4: to put my energy towards that. So I do think
Speaker 4: that allows me to be with people or to kind
Speaker 4: of absorb more information than others, because sometimes it might
Speaker 4: be a little bit overstimulating, so a little bit of
Speaker 4: the information just goes over top of people's heads.
Speaker 1: That Yeah, what how can I ask you? Just I'm
Speaker 1: an exercise scientist. I'm interested in the height and the
Speaker 1: physical health and all that shit. Right, So how tall
Speaker 1: are you? Oh?
Speaker 4: I think I would be like maybe one seventy centimeters.
Speaker 4: I would have to like measure myself.
Speaker 1: Okay, so yeah at one round one, at one fifty,
Speaker 1: you're at one hundred and fifty kilos.
Speaker 3: You're a very big boy, right, Oh yeah, yeah I was.
Speaker 3: I would have been.
Speaker 4: I classed myself and definitely the doctors classed me at
Speaker 4: that time.
Speaker 1: Is more but the obese. Yeah, and what did you
Speaker 1: get down to? Because you look healthy and fit and
Speaker 1: strong like, well.
Speaker 4: I'm actually I'm probably about currently right now, I'm probably
Speaker 4: about ten kilos heavier than what I would love to be.
Speaker 4: I have been about ten kilos lighter than I am now,
Speaker 4: which was around about eighty kilos. That was the fittest
Speaker 4: I've been, So that was, yeah, probably my biggest weight loss.
Speaker 4: And now I do hob around the ninety mark. My
Speaker 4: body is comfortable there. But I did love it a
Speaker 4: few years back when I did get down to eighty
Speaker 4: because you know, I felt the rip this I'd ever been.
Speaker 4: I was going to the beach without the shirt on,
Speaker 4: and it was that was the first that was such
Speaker 4: a big experience for me to be going to a
Speaker 4: beach without me top on. Wow, that was massive for
Speaker 4: me because I'd like never done that before. I was
Speaker 4: always so self conscious of taking my shirt off. So yeah,
Speaker 4: to be able to kind of be fit and feel normal,
Speaker 4: just like, you know, in a normal body, that was amazing.
Speaker 4: So yeah, but yeah, around eighty to ninety I sort
Speaker 4: of now, but yeah, I'd like to get back there
Speaker 4: for sure. I've got to pull we figure out, so
Speaker 4: to speak, get me ars in the gear and get
Speaker 4: running because I actually am planning to do run Melbourne
Speaker 4: next year as well. So I did the five k
Speaker 4: last year, I want to do the ten k this
Speaker 4: year coming. So yeah, I got to get back into
Speaker 4: running for sure.
Speaker 1: Well, and so when you're running, like, how does that work?
Speaker 1: How does that work? Do you run with a partner?
Speaker 1: Do you just bump into shit constantly?
Speaker 4: So I when I'm in locally, so when I'm back
Speaker 4: home in Horsham, I know the surrounds of Horseham.
Speaker 3: I've lived in our entire life, and I've had the
Speaker 3: luxury also.
Speaker 4: Growing up in town when I did have twenty twenty vision,
Speaker 4: so I have great muscle memory of kind of where
Speaker 4: things are. So I can quite comfortably go for a
Speaker 4: run or go for a walk around our river because
Speaker 4: it's got a nice pathway. It's quite nice, and I
Speaker 4: can get myself from A to B pretty well.
Speaker 3: They're unassisted.
Speaker 4: If I was to go for a walk or a
Speaker 4: run somewhere in the city or a suburb in Melbourne,
Speaker 4: I yeah, especially if I was going for a run,
Speaker 4: I would want to go with someone, Especially the first
Speaker 4: few times. I wouldn't just sort of will and literally
Speaker 4: just go for a run and see where I get to.
Speaker 3: And I definitely still could, but I feel.
Speaker 4: Like, yeah, if you wanted to do it on like
Speaker 4: a professional level kind of thing and actually do it consistently,
Speaker 4: I would like to sell up a routine with someone.
Speaker 4: But yeah, around locally, Yeah, I know my bearings pretty well.
Speaker 4: That's not to say I don't get lost every now
Speaker 4: and then. Occasionally I kind of go off path and
Speaker 4: I'm sort of in amongst the sticks and I think.
Speaker 3: Oh, hold on, I think I'm a little bit shrew
Speaker 3: with here.
Speaker 4: It was actually funny too, because earlier this year I
Speaker 4: was going for a run. Back when I did, it
Speaker 4: was one hundred k away for Vision Australia, so it
Speaker 4: was April, and I was running up towards and I
Speaker 4: thought there was this big stick on the ground and
Speaker 4: then as I ran over the top of it, I
Speaker 4: saw it move. So it was actually a brown snake.
Speaker 4: So that kind of wigged me out a little bit.
Speaker 4: That was the first time I'd seen a snake that
Speaker 4: close in the sort of wild.
Speaker 3: But yeah, or.
Speaker 1: More specifically, hadn't seen a snake. I've seen us seen
Speaker 1: a sticky mate like in the old days. I don't
Speaker 1: know if this is still a term, so excuse my ignorance.
Speaker 1: I've got l plates on for this conversation because I
Speaker 1: don't know is the term legally blind? Is that still
Speaker 1: a term?
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, I still use it. That's how I refer
Speaker 3: to myself quite often.
Speaker 1: So what qualifies somebody to be legally blind? Like what
Speaker 1: percentage of vision or how does that work?
Speaker 4: Yes, so depending if you're in America or Australia, there's
Speaker 4: different eye charts and different signals depend on what you are.
Speaker 4: But essentially it's if you look at the eye chart
Speaker 4: at an optometrist and you can't see the very big
Speaker 4: top number. So if you can't see that sitting in
Speaker 4: the optometrists chair from the distance you're sitting, that means
Speaker 4: that you have lost significant vision and you're class legally blind.
Speaker 4: So that essentially means you have twenty two hundred vision.
Speaker 4: So that means that what someone could see often to
Speaker 4: the distance from two hundred meters away, you would only
Speaker 4: be able to see from twenty.
Speaker 3: Meters away, and it would be a lot blurrier than
Speaker 3: what someone with twenty twenty vision would see.
Speaker 4: In America, they actually go by twenty sixty vision, so
Speaker 4: they would say that sixty meters away, someone that could
Speaker 4: see something off into the distance sixty meters you would
Speaker 4: only be able to see.
Speaker 3: From about twenty meters.
Speaker 4: So that's the very baseline of legal blindness and then yeah,
Speaker 4: you can still definitely continue to lose more vision after that.
Speaker 4: But yeah, very few people are considered completely blind, which
Speaker 4: that isn't actually the term. It's called NLP, so no
Speaker 4: light perception, and that's when you have no vision whatsoever.
Speaker 3: But yeah, that's probably.
Speaker 4: Yeah, less than ten percent of people that are considered
Speaker 4: yeah blind or legally blind would have no light perception.
Speaker 4: So yeah, quite a lot of us will still see
Speaker 4: some colors some light. But for me personally, if I'm outside,
Speaker 4: I have to wear pretty dark sunglasses because yeah, it
Speaker 4: look like I watched like a romcom or some mighty
Speaker 4: sad movie for two hours.
Speaker 3: My eyes just start crying in the sun.
Speaker 1: If you and I were let's say, I don't know,
Speaker 1: if we're in a room and I'm in front of you,
Speaker 1: I'm three meters away from you, and it's a pretty
Speaker 1: well lit room, what are you going to see?
Speaker 4: So I would be able to see the color of
Speaker 4: your shirt and pants, probably, I don't know if I
Speaker 4: would be able to differentiate, Say, if you're wearing a
Speaker 4: blue pair of jeans and a black shirt, my eyes
Speaker 4: just might pick it up as a dark navy color
Speaker 4: mixed together. So I might be able to see sort
Speaker 4: of the shape of your body kind of thing. I
Speaker 4: would be able to see the shape of your head.
Speaker 4: But most people, when I look at their their face,
Speaker 4: it usually is just sort of a mix of their yeah,
Speaker 4: their skin color sort of mixed in. I can't see
Speaker 4: sort of eyeballs or facial features.
Speaker 3: Nose, mouth, that sort of thing.
Speaker 4: I do see a little bit better out of my
Speaker 4: peripheral vision. So something that is worth mentioning is that
Speaker 4: the bulk of my blindness is my central vision.
Speaker 3: So when I look directly on at.
Speaker 4: People right in the face, so you know, respectfully, we
Speaker 4: make eye contact with people when we speak to them.
Speaker 3: So I still actually do that to this day.
Speaker 4: I will look at people in the eye, but it's
Speaker 4: only for the other person's benefits, so they think that
Speaker 4: I'm respectful because I can't actually see when I look
Speaker 4: at them in the eye that way direct on, I
Speaker 4: would actually be better off kind of looking side on.
Speaker 4: And I do see a little bit clearer out of
Speaker 4: my peripheral vision, it's still not super clear. It's not
Speaker 4: like twenty twenty, or I wouldn't be able to probably
Speaker 4: tell someone, oh, you've got green eyes or you've got
Speaker 4: blue eyes. I wouldn't be able to do that, but yeah,
Speaker 4: it's a little bit better than looking dead on.
Speaker 1: Well, if I want to give you any shit, I'm
Speaker 1: going to stand straight in front of you for sure. Thanks, thanks,
Speaker 1: thanks for the heads up. So let's just weel back
Speaker 1: to the first time you went. I don't know if
Speaker 1: it was the first time you went to an optometrist,
Speaker 1: but I don't know what on earth would I mean.
Speaker 1: I know you're not lying, I know it's true, but
Speaker 1: I can't I almost can't believe that a medical professional,
Speaker 1: an optimologist would say, would call you, would tell your
Speaker 1: mum that you're a retard, because when you have a legitimate,
Speaker 1: serious issue with your eyes, not only do they not
Speaker 1: figure that out, they insult you. I mean, apart from
Speaker 1: how that was for you, which was fucking horrible, and like,
Speaker 1: I don't even understand how that happened. Was there any firstly, well,
Speaker 1: tell us about how that was for you in a minute.
Speaker 1: But before we get there, was there any consequences, because
Speaker 1: I want to punch that person in the face.
Speaker 4: Definitely, there was definitely a few stern words, you know,
Speaker 4: from your mother's and definitely I was probably yes, seven
Speaker 4: or at the time, so I didn't really understand that
Speaker 4: the weight of the words that were said.
Speaker 3: It really kind of affected me a few years after.
Speaker 4: I really feel like that's when it started to affect me,
Speaker 4: those couple of experiences getting my diagnosis.
Speaker 3: But yeah, it was probably six months before that.
Speaker 4: We'd had multiple different diagnosises and dyslexia, and then you
Speaker 4: get the bifocal glasses, and then you know, you get
Speaker 4: all these different tests and they were all pretty fine
Speaker 4: but didn't lead to any answers, and then yeah, we
Speaker 4: had the sort of the specialist appointment and I can
Speaker 4: say that he is no longer practicing. It wasn't I
Speaker 4: didn't personally or our family didn't personally put in a
Speaker 4: complaint or anything like that.
Speaker 3: But it wasn't the since learning.
Speaker 4: Otherwise, it's not the first experience of being called retired,
Speaker 4: Like I wasn't the first person where who's had that
Speaker 4: experience with that particular optometrist. So really, yeah, this is
Speaker 4: back in two thousand and six too, so it was
Speaker 4: a bit of a different time.
Speaker 3: People really did feed into the stereotype.
Speaker 4: So I rocked up at the optometrist appointment, and I
Speaker 4: didn't I guess I didn't look blind.
Speaker 3: I didn't have a cane, I didn't have.
Speaker 4: A guide dog or the real dark sunni is at
Speaker 4: the time, And because I could still be quite independent,
Speaker 4: it was like they couldn't understand, like, if you're saying
Speaker 4: you can't see, well, how are you doing this?
Speaker 3: So then I guess it really frustrated them.
Speaker 4: And it was also a combination of it, Yes, starguts
Speaker 4: not having much research or not being easily detectable, that really,
Speaker 4: I guess, yeah, infuriated him. It kind of reminds me
Speaker 4: of I tell people, especially when I'm I guess at
Speaker 4: younger school groups, I say, you know the movie inside.
Speaker 3: Out with all the different characters.
Speaker 4: You've got happiness, you've got joy, you've got sadness, and anger. Well,
Speaker 4: he reminded me of anger that day, Like I really
Speaker 4: felt like you could feel the steam coming out of
Speaker 4: his ears.
Speaker 3: And yeah, I feel like it probably did affect my mother.
Speaker 4: And my family more at the time that experience than
Speaker 4: it did personally me. I have found out in later
Speaker 4: years that that was quite challenging for mum and she
Speaker 4: was very upset, and so with my grandparents at the time,
Speaker 4: And so you do learn after the fact.
Speaker 3: Hindsight, it's a beautiful thing. I guess.
Speaker 4: Yeah, my family, I suppose tried to protect me or
Speaker 4: shield me a bit from that side of things, and
Speaker 4: I guess they were so shocked to think that I'd
Speaker 4: been cold, a retard or it was directed at mum,
Speaker 4: but I was there present. I feel like they did
Speaker 4: that really did sort of scare them into the next
Speaker 4: steps of Okay, well, how do we get a diagnosis?
Speaker 4: But yeah, we were lucky enough that we did find
Speaker 4: the amazing fresh out of Uni passionate ophthalmologist, and yeah,
Speaker 4: we got the diagnosis. And it is important to note
Speaker 4: that Stargut's disease, the gene that is connected to Stargus's disease,
Speaker 4: was only discovered in nineteen ninety six, so they hadn't
Speaker 4: had a hell of a lot of time to really
Speaker 4: research it.
Speaker 3: In a heap of detail. And when I was diagnosed yet,
Speaker 3: it was in two thousand and five.
Speaker 4: Two thousand and six was that period of the diagnosis journey,
Speaker 4: So it was only yeah, nine or ten years since
Speaker 4: they'd really understood what Stargus's disease is.
Speaker 1: So you know, what I think is what I think
Speaker 1: is ironic is that that he I don't even want
Speaker 1: to say the word right, but he laid you that right.
Speaker 1: But ironically, I would have I think you were probably
Speaker 1: much smarter than average, not even average, but way smarter
Speaker 1: than average because people couldn't even tell that you had
Speaker 1: a disability, Like you navigated life without this incredibly important
Speaker 1: ability that nearly everyone has, and you were so good
Speaker 1: at faking it for one of a better word and
Speaker 1: problem solving, like you're navigating the world not being able
Speaker 1: to fucking see and people don't even know. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's a whole different kind of intelligence. Like that's social intelligence,
Speaker 1: that's emotional intelligence, communication like that is that is so
Speaker 1: the fact that you figured out how to do that
Speaker 1: so that people couldn't even tell you how to disability
Speaker 1: at such a young age, it's kind of amazing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I really do.
Speaker 4: Actually, Like in hindsight, I look back and I think,
Speaker 4: you know, the mental health side of things and the
Speaker 4: depression and that side of things that was, you know,
Speaker 4: a byproduct of my experiences that you know, it definitely
Speaker 4: shaped me into the person I am. But I wouldn't
Speaker 4: go back and wish it upon any young person because
Speaker 4: it was.
Speaker 3: A horrible time in my life.
Speaker 4: But you know, that's why I do what I do now,
Speaker 4: is that so I can bring others out of their
Speaker 4: shell and then still confidence in others. But yeah, definitely
Speaker 4: at the time, I look back now and I do
Speaker 4: think that because I didn't want people.
Speaker 3: To know that I was going blind, in a way,
Speaker 3: it did really.
Speaker 4: Allow me to almost be like I sort of referred
Speaker 4: to it as like, you know, the undercover blind person
Speaker 4: or the you know, the Bruce Wayne of blindness. And yeah,
Speaker 4: I don't regret it at all, because you know, I
Speaker 4: just lived. I just woke up every day. In my family.
Speaker 4: I was never treated as someone who was blind. So
Speaker 4: that was also a really good benefit because I just
Speaker 4: lived normally, So there was none of that sort of
Speaker 4: bubble rat gold star approach. But it was because I
Speaker 4: didn't it happened, and in a way it did take
Speaker 4: away from sort of me being able to connect with
Speaker 4: certain people, and you know, it did turn into that
Speaker 4: victimhood mentality. But now I'm in a place where I
Speaker 4: am today, I actually kind of redefined that chapter in
Speaker 4: my life and I actually think that it had it
Speaker 4: gave me the skills to this day, I still navigate
Speaker 4: very well, I'm still very independent and very confident, and.
Speaker 3: I really do feel like it.
Speaker 4: It's so hard to describe, but yeah, there's so many
Speaker 4: things that you just learn how to adapt, and I
Speaker 4: don't get it right all the time. Sometimes I'll see
Speaker 4: a blob and I'll think, oh, that's the fridge door,
Speaker 4: and then it turns out to be a microwave or something.
Speaker 4: So there's definitely things that I completely mess up. But
Speaker 4: for the most part, all those years of really trying
Speaker 4: to yeah, not be known as the person that was
Speaker 4: losing their vision, Yeah, it really helped me to be
Speaker 4: able to navigate around pretty much undercover, even to this day.
Speaker 4: A lot of people, if I walked past someone down
Speaker 4: the main street, if I didn't tell them that I was,
Speaker 4: you know, losing vision or something, or if they didn't
Speaker 4: see me try to get my phone out and read
Speaker 4: a menu with my screen or eader on, they.
Speaker 3: Would have no idea.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, yeah, what do you what's the This is
Speaker 6: a selfish question, NA, what's what's the what's the deal
Speaker 6: with guide dogs?
Speaker 1: When do we get a puppy? Is there is there
Speaker 1: like do you qualify for a guide dog?
Speaker 4: Or I've got I've got currently a little guide dog
Speaker 4: at home that's not actually a proper guy dog.
Speaker 3: I call him Boris the Bastard. He's a true Hour.
Speaker 4: So my sister got a dog a few years back
Speaker 4: at the start of COVID.
Speaker 3: And it latched onto me.
Speaker 4: So now I'm the owner of a four year old
Speaker 4: Chu Hour, So I'm stuck with him until I'm probably
Speaker 4: blenty forty, but definitely the definitely in the future, when
Speaker 4: I'm older or my next dog, I will definitely look
Speaker 4: into getting a guide dog. How it works is so
Speaker 4: you first do cane training, so you do accessibility training,
Speaker 4: and you learn.
Speaker 3: How to use a cane.
Speaker 4: Now I did that years and years ago, and I
Speaker 4: only to this day still only use a cane in
Speaker 4: situations where I'm very unfamiliar, so maybe like an airport
Speaker 4: or when I arrive at Melbourne at Southern Cross station,
Speaker 4: I'll get my cane out that sort of thing. But
Speaker 4: for the most part, I even to this day, still
Speaker 4: don't use a cane a hell of a lot. But
Speaker 4: definitely you first start with the cane training and then
Speaker 4: you can if you want.
Speaker 3: To look in to get in a guide dog.
Speaker 4: There are sort of characteristics or credentials to get a
Speaker 4: guide dog, you have to be significantly visually impaired. But
Speaker 4: I would definitely fit that criteria, but I just haven't
Speaker 4: looked into it personally myself. But definitely in the future, Yeah,
Speaker 4: I'll definitely get a guide dog in some chapter of
Speaker 4: my life. But yeah, currently at the moment, I've got
Speaker 4: a two hour.
Speaker 1: Yeah that seems more like a problem than a fucking assistance.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, it seems like they're going to add work
Speaker 1: to your day.
Speaker 4: I never would have like, I love him now, of
Speaker 4: course because he's more but I would have never personally
Speaker 4: like to how I used always want like.
Speaker 3: A corgy or a pug or something.
Speaker 4: But yeah, definitely, though in the future I want to
Speaker 4: guide dog. And as my vision does progress, because it
Speaker 4: is a progressive disease, so you know, when I am
Speaker 4: forty and when I am fifty, my starguts disease. There
Speaker 4: is a high chance it's quite stable at the moment,
Speaker 4: which I'm very grateful for. It's been quite stable for
Speaker 4: many years, but it will continue to degenerate and then
Speaker 4: as I do age, my vision naturally will get a
Speaker 4: little bit a little bit shot over the years as well.
Speaker 4: So in the future I think it will definitely be
Speaker 4: one hundred percent beneficial for me to have a guide dog,
Speaker 4: but I can't see it happening.
Speaker 3: Yeah, in the next.
Speaker 4: Few years while I got my hands full with Yeah,
Speaker 4: boris the bastard, that's for sure.
Speaker 1: Well, boris the bastard. Now, speaking of speaking of relationships,
Speaker 1: can I be cheeky and ask you about relationships? Are
Speaker 1: you track? Are you tracking steady as the old people
Speaker 1: say with anyone?
Speaker 4: No, I'm single as a at the moment, But over
Speaker 4: the years I had a few sort of friends and
Speaker 4: benefits kind of deal and a few nice but yeah,
Speaker 4: at the moment, yeah, single as a pringle.
Speaker 1: Friends with benefits, you heard it here first, friends with Well,
Speaker 1: I think we're looking more than that, Matt. I think
Speaker 1: we're looking for some kind of you know, Hey, mate,
Speaker 1: you're a gun. It's fucking so nice meeting you. You're funny,
Speaker 1: you're clever, you're an inspiration. Tell my audience about how
Speaker 1: they can connect with you, or if they want to
Speaker 1: book you for an event or to work with their
Speaker 1: team or their company or their school. How do they
Speaker 1: go about that?
Speaker 4: Oh, one hundred percent? Well, you can find me by
Speaker 4: typing into Google. Matt Degricci Vision or you can type
Speaker 4: in MDV. I'm also on the social so Instagram and Facebook,
Speaker 4: YouTube LinkedIn all that stuff. I do also post my
Speaker 4: stuff on TikTok. I don't personally use it because I
Speaker 4: personally and bias against and I think that app is
Speaker 4: the devil. But that's that's the day and age believe,
Speaker 4: so I've got to post my content on there so
Speaker 4: you can find me across all the platforms at Matt
Speaker 4: Degricci Vision and on my website at mattd Degoucci vision
Speaker 4: dot com. But I just I should also say I
Speaker 4: have the I suppose the unprivilege of having sharing the
Speaker 4: same name as another person whose name is Matt de Grucci,
Speaker 4: who is a serial killer who murdered his family. So
Speaker 4: I have had the battle over the past eight years
Speaker 4: since doing my own disability and blindness advocacy. That yeah,
Speaker 4: the Google results when you type in Matt de Grucci,
Speaker 4: you will probably be met with a few pages of
Speaker 4: the serial killer version that's not me. Please don't get
Speaker 4: it confused, because you would be surprised how many dms
Speaker 4: and our website messages I get saying you're going to hell,
Speaker 4: You've you've committed crimes against humanity, and I'm like, that's
Speaker 4: the wrong Matt.
Speaker 3: That's the wrong Matt. But you can find me for sure.
Speaker 1: I know I did the exact same thing. He's absolutely everyone.
Speaker 1: Because I had a bit of you know what happens
Speaker 1: is because I do a podcast every day, Melissa or
Speaker 1: Tiff sends me through some info and I just read
Speaker 1: a bit of an overview or a bio or a synopsis,
Speaker 1: and then it was quite short. I'm like, okay, cool,
Speaker 1: And then I thought I'd just jump into you know,
Speaker 1: doctor Google, and then this fucking person who killed his family.
Speaker 1: I'm like, what have we got this bloke done for?
Speaker 1: It's not the thank god, it's not the same.
Speaker 3: I'm working on it.
Speaker 4: I'm trying to get my name to appear higher on
Speaker 4: Google than the serial killer version of my name.
Speaker 3: So that's a work in progress.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is. That is kind of terrifying but funny
Speaker 1: all at the same time. Hey, Mabel, well say goodbye
Speaker 1: fair but for the moment, Thanks so much, Matt. We
Speaker 1: appreciate you and you're genuinely an inspiration, and thanks so
Speaker 1: much for what you're doing and all the work that
Speaker 1: you're doing and sharing insights and stories and information and
Speaker 1: helping people with disability as well. It's amazing.
Speaker 3: No, thank you for having me Harts, and thank you Tiff,
Speaker 3: it's been great. Thank you, thank you,