WASHINGTON (WUSA) - Over 120-thousand people in the US are blind from glaucoma. One patient is overcoming obstacles in the face of her advanced glaucoma in a different kind of way.
Amy Dixon is a US paratriathlete with uveitic, neovascular, and what she calls steroid-induced glaucomas – all three affecting her ability to see. None of which have been successful at diminishing her spirit.
Dixon just earned a silver medal at the CAMTRI, Continental Triathlon Championships in Mexico in May 2015.
Her disease is not something new. Diagnosed seventeen years ago, Dixon has learned ways to overcome her circumstances in both her career and her athletic abilities.
"I work in the wine industry," remarks Dixon, "I've been doing it for twenty years. But more recently, within the past two years, I've become a professional athlete."
Professional sommeliers need to identify, pour and un-cork wines. Triathletes on Team USA must run, bike, and swim. Becoming accomplished as a sommelier or as a triathlete are fetes many Americans never achieve. Dixon has done them both, with what she says is a black curtain in front of her eyes.
Back in college when she still had her sight, Dixon was a college swimming star at UConn. Upon hearing the news of her diagnoses, Dixon says, "I never dreamed I could become as athletic as she used to be." She credits social media for her turn in attitude.
"I heard about some women that were visually impaired that were doing triathlons," says Dixon. At first she couldn't wrap her head around the logistics of completing a course with no visual cues.
Her friends clued her in that she would be biking tandem, swimming and running with a training partner - something she says is akin to her guide dog Elvis. Once she understood, she never looked back and now she's full speed ahead to the 2016 Paralympics in Rio.
Dixon's competitive side has been the gift she didn't expect to receive from glaucoma.
"I never imagined that being blind and being an athlete were going to be in the same sentence," she admits.
She believe it's a whole new world for her- one that is opening her eyes in a way they haven't been in years.
"I feel like I've been given a gift, that I have a lot of ability and not disability, per se," says Dixon.
Right now there is no cure for glaucoma, but there are cannabis based pharmaceuticals in the pipeline that some think could one day halt the progression of the eye disease. Amy believes this could have benefited her if they had been developed sooner.
