Blind Broward athlete’s historic cross-country bike ride shines in new documentary – WSVN 7News | Miami News, Weather, Sports | Fort Lauderdale
(WSVN) – A South Florida woman has made history — becoming the first blind person to cross the country alone on a bicycle. Her epic journey is now the focus of a new documentary. Heather Walker has tonight’s 7 Spotlight.
In the snow and through the rain.
Shawn Cheshire: “Kind of hard to believe that it’s actually happening.”
From Oregon to Virginia Beach, Shawn Cheshire took a bike riding adventure that’s difficult under the best of circumstances.
But Shawn is blind.
Shawn Cheshire: “It was my idea, and I asked my friends, I was like, ‘Hey, can you guys help me figure out how to do this?’”
And they said?
Shawn Cheshire: “‘You’re crazy. OK,’ ’cause they knew I was gonna try to figure out a way to do it regardless.”
Shawn lives in Lauderdale-By-The-Sea with her guide dog Nick. She was not born blind.
The Army veteran started to lose her eyesight in 2009, at the age of 36, after she fell while working as a paramedic.
Shawn Cheshire: “A closed head injury. It was a traumatic brain injury. I don’t remember the accident.”
What she does remember is the gradual loss of her vision.
Shawn Cheshire: “My visual field started, like, if I was looking like I could only see here. And then, over the course of the next year and a half, it just kind of went like this to nothing. It’s scary. I think I was paralyzed by fear and sadness. I attempted to take my life twice.”
But Shawn persevered, beginning to push herself — mentally and physically. She took up cycling.
Shawn Cheshire: “I think that it was unknown, and I was lost, and it gave me a purpose.”
She competed in the Paralympics in 2016, on the back of a tandem bike with a sighted person.
But her history-making 2021 ride across America would be different: She would ride alone.
Shawn Cheshire: “Within the first two weeks, I was like, I’m never going to make it. It was so mentally and emotionally exhausting.”
Guide: “OK, turn a little right, lift, come back left.”
Shawn’s team guided her through speakers in her helmet.
Shawn Cheshire: “So it’s just constant talking and constant sound.”
A film crew captured the 60-day ride in a documentary called “Blind AF,” showing the unprecedented and dangerous trek.
Shawn Cheshire: “Wind, bumps, everything affected me differently, because as a sighted person, you can prep for it, and everything hit me by surprise.”
The filmmakers worked with Shawn to create point-of-view animations, so viewers could see how she experiences the world.
And the documentary is about more than a bike ride. It also explores traumas in Shawn’s past prior to her accident, from child abuse to domestic violence.
Shawn Cheshire: “When you watch the documentary, you will be watching healing in motion.”
The documentary was just screened at Miami Lighthouse for the Blind. Shawn hopes it reaches visually impaired kids, who she calls “our future adventurers.”
Shawn Cheshire: “Maybe this will inspire them to push themselves and be scared, but still do something, or maybe it’ll just help someone not feel alone.”
And yes, the “AF” in the film’s title stands for.
Shawn Cheshire: “As [expletive]. Blind as [expletive]. Everybody who knows me, when they hear the name of the documentary, they’re like, ‘Oh yeah, that’s Shawn.‘”
A four-letter word that in this case is less about profanity and more about perseverance.
Heather Walker, 7News.
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