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In Episode 8 of #BlindTok, Murray Elbourne and Tammy Jackson sit down with Alison DeFranco, an international human rights lawyer whose journey from small-town New York to Jakarta, Mexico City, and a tiny Irish island most people have never heard of started with a question her mom asked over spring break: why are you holding that book so close? What followed was a Stargardt's diagnosis, a wildly unhelpful eye doctor with a knack for terrifying parents in the next room, and the start of a long chapter of hiding, masking, and shooting an alarming number of three-pointers along the way.
This one digs into the moments that quietly forge an advocate, from a college admissions decision that went sideways for all the wrong reasons to a New Zealand bus that talked back. Alison shares the airport adventure she swears nobody should ever recreate, the Irish ambassador who insisted she write a book with an unprintable title, and the slow shift from passing as sighted to standing fully in her own story. Funny, sharp, and quietly powerful, it's a conversation about what gets built when you stop apologizing for the way you see the world.
In Episode 8 of #BlindTok, Murray Elbourne and Tammy Jackson sit down with Alison DeFranco, an international human rights lawyer whose journey from small-town New York to Jakarta, Mexico City, and a tiny Irish island most people have never heard of started with a question her mom asked over spring break: why are you holding that book so close? What followed was a Stargardt's diagnosis, a wildly unhelpful eye doctor with a knack for terrifying parents in the next room, and the start of a long chapter of hiding, masking, and shooting an alarming number of three-pointers along the way.
This one digs into the moments that quietly forge an advocate, from a college admissions decision that went sideways for all the wrong reasons to a New Zealand bus that talked back. Alison shares the airport adventure she swears nobody should ever recreate, the Irish ambassador who insisted she write a book with an unprintable title, and the slow shift from passing as sighted to standing fully in her own story. Funny, sharp, and quietly powerful, it's a conversation about what gets built when you stop apologizing for the way you see the world.
#BlindTok is the weekly podcast where the vision loss community finally gets to have the conversations that matter without having to explain the basics first. Hosted by Murray Elbourne, CEO of Amerability, and co-host Tammy Jackson, a healthcare professional navigating life with retinitis pigmentosa, this show brings together real stories, real struggles, and real laughs from people across the entire blindness spectrum. Every week tackles topics the community actually cares about, from social isolation and career reinvention to dating disasters, cane anxiety, family dynamics, accessible tech that actually works, and everything in between. Guests from all walks of life share the messy, unscripted truth about adjusting to vision loss, the kind of honesty that never makes it into awareness campaigns but absolutely needs to be heard.
Whether you're newly diagnosed and trying to figure out what comes next, years into your journey and navigating a rough patch, or someone who loves a person with vision loss and wants to truly understand their world, this podcast meets you where you are. Born out of the thriving #BlindTok community on TikTok, where thousands have already found connection through shared experience, this show gives those conversations the space and depth they deserve. Expect candid storytelling, practical insights, community questions, the occasional embarrassing moment that every person with vision loss will immediately relate to, and two hosts who live this life every single day and aren't afraid to talk about all of it. New episodes drop weekly because this community waited long enough for a seat at the table, and now the table is ours.