Celia Petersen spent decades in rural Arizona, living in the wide-open desert between Phoenix and the California border. She was a teacher for gifted students in bilingual education, but mainly she helped run a family farm.
“The farm evolved as farming did,” Celia recalls. “I raised horses and taught riding lessons. With a huge outdoor area, we raised organic, free-range chickens, goats, and sheep.” She and her husband were also regulars at the local farmers’ market, selling goats’ milk, soap, and cheese each weekend.
Another long standing passion of Celia’s is creating woolen goods, spinning the fleece from her sheep into yarn that she knits into hats and gloves, among other things.
Celia also has glaucoma. And while she had been living with the disease for several years, it became much more noticeable when she moved to Texas a few years ago. When exiting the post office, going from a dark hallway into the bright outside, her vision failed her. She ended up falling off a curb and doing significant damage to her left knee and breaking her right wrist.
The fall got her back into an eye doctor’s office where Celia learned that her glaucoma had advanced quite a bit. “One eye doesn't have any vision at all, and the other eye is not doing great either,” she says.
Celia found Hadley while searching online. “I started every day listening to a Hadley podcast. Listening to Insights & Sound Bites cheers me up. It makes me feel like I’m not alone.” To date, Celia has also taken more than ninety workshops, participates in several of our monthly discussion groups, and has two peers as part of our peer-to-peer initiative.
But it was a call from a Hadley specialist, Debbie Worman, who has since passed away, that made all the difference to Celia. “She was so kind and pushy in a good way,” Celia remembers. “I found Hadley by chance and was new to Texas. Debbie encouraged me and helped me prepare for an upcoming doctor’s appointment. She helped me think about using a cane and even learning braille, things I was kind of embarrassed and scared about.”
Celia is now back to her crafts. She is not only back to spinning fleece and making woolen goods, she also is back in the community and uses that opportunity to share her story and even fundraise for Hadley. She found a local farmers’ market where she sets up her spinning wheel. “Seeing me at the spinning wheel with my cane and dark glasses brings people over,” Celia says. “I’m surprised by how many people I talk to about their own vision problems or who share stories from their own families. I reassure them that life’s not over but that they may need to learn new ways to do things.” She also hands out Hadley pamphlets and encourages the community to support our work.
And this all goes back to one phone call from Debbie, Celia recalls. “I was really going to give up. I felt like I lost my whole life. I really felt untethered. I didn't know what I was going to do. One phone call from Debbie made all the difference in the world to me.” You can hear Celia’s own contribution to Insights & Sound Bites.
For all that she has done to support Hadley and the community at large, Celia has been named a Hadley HERO. Thank you, Celia!