Glider Spotlight: Meet Amy Ruell

In this monthly series, we put the spotlight on our Gliders community to celebrate individuals who inspire us. This month, we’re highlighting Amy Ruell - psychotherapist, volunteer, advisor, and advocate.

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Tell us a bit about your background and upbringing

I am 72, have been blind since birth, and am a married mother of two grown children and three grandchildren. My total blindness resulted from retinopathy of prematurity, and I spent the first few months of my life in an incubator. I grew up in a small town in western Massachusetts.

Because the school for the blind was 100 miles from my home, my mother advocated for me to attend the local public school system—something that was not often done at that time. After some initial resistance from the school administration, I was told I could try public school if I succeeded in a preschool environment.

My classmates and I quickly figured out that if I was going to keep up with the rest of the class, they would either need to talk so I could follow them or grab my hand, as young children were not given white canes in those days. At preschool, I distinguished myself by locking a classmate who teased me in the closet and then running away. Today, that might result in a referral for therapy to address anger management issues, but back then it was seen as amusing—and perhaps an early indicator of my spirited response to adversity.

Once the school staff realized I was like all the other children except for my visual disability, I was readily accepted and received an excellent education. I learned Braille from my mother and a volunteer from town, who stayed just one lesson ahead of me. I learned to type in second grade from that same volunteer and a book, and I participated in virtually all activities alongside my sighted peers.

There were challenges along the way. Mastering geometry from a book on tape without tactile diagrams was a nightmare, and I often wondered why no one thought to explain the next moves on the uneven parallel bars until after I was already hanging upside down. Still, I learned how to help those around me feel comfortable with me, and I was expected to perform to the best of my ability—an expectation that helped me develop high standards for myself.

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Where do you live? How did you end up there?

Since I was about six years old, I have vacationed in southern Maine. After obtaining my college degree, I moved to the Boston area, where I lived until three years ago. My husband of 42 years and I visited southern Maine nearly every summer after we met.

As we began contemplating retirement—and as an acquired hearing impairment made crossing busy city streets more challenging—we decided to move full-time to the small village of 1,400 residents where we now live. Our community boasts one of the best beaches in the country, offers many cultural opportunities, and has wonderful theater and restaurants.

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What type of work do you do—both volunteer and otherwise?

I currently work part-time as a psychotherapist and specialize in helping those who struggle with adjusting to visual disability. For many years, I worked full-time as a trauma therapist in both public and private settings and had the privilege of working with people from all walks of life.

I also took a seven-year hiatus from my clinical career to run a national early literacy program for National Braille Press. In addition, I have volunteered as an advisor and advocate for audio description, presided for about 20 years over the first group for blind computer users in the country, and served on the national board of directors and multiple committees for the National Federation of the Blind, as well as serving as president of the Massachusetts NFB affiliate.

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What’s one big question in life, work, or society at large that’s been occupying your mind lately?

One issue that increasingly concerns me is the role of technology in our lives. I wonder how we can use these powerful tools to our advantage while preserving the primacy of social relationships and human interaction, which I believe are so integral to enrichment and joy.

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Who would play you in a movie about your life?

I’m not much of a movie enthusiast, so this is a difficult question. I would hope the person playing me would be intelligent, forthright, and outspoken—tenacious, compassionate, and possessed of a good sense of humor.

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If you won the lottery but didn’t tell anyone, how would your friends and family know?

The only way friends and family might guess I had won the lottery would be if I started booking more extravagant trips, flying first class, and feeding my voracious appetite for new releases by purchasing even more audiobooks.

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Anything else you’d like to share with the Gliders community?

I am delighted to be on this exciting journey with the Glidance team as a founding Glider. I hope we can all be patient and enjoy the process of contributing to a revolutionary development in mobility for the blind as this technology continues to evolve!

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