“I try to see the positives in life every day and see life for what it is: a gift.” Isabelle took part in the Encourager Meeting in the Eifel, meeting people for the first time who had experienced a similar story to hers.
Such a courageous step.
“If I had grown up with all these wonderful people, perhaps my path would have been easier. To have met these people is a huge gift. I have gained strength and, above all, confidence.”

It took 22 YEARS for Isabelle to go public with her story – to finally come to terms with it – and contact KAKS.
Over 20 years after being diagnosed with retinoblastoma.
Enucleation was not enough for Isabelle – due to an allergy to the implant, she had to be operated on a total of five more times at the ages of 5, 12 and 13.
Complicated operations that also had cosmetic consequences.
And yet she says: “It didn’t really bother me as a child, I felt like my favorite Harry Potter character because I survived something that was actually fatal when I was little. Even though other children called me a pirate because of my eye patches, I wasn’t ashamed. I liked being a pirate, like Elizabeth from Pirates of the Caribbean, brave and confident!”

Unfortunately, this self-confidence was lost again as Isabelle got older.
When she was no longer the pirate, but the “one-eyed monster” or the “freak”.
She began to feel ashamed, sometimes she could hardly look in the mirror and just wanted to be like everyone else.
She developed depression and a body image disorder and began to consciously set herself apart from everyone else because she felt she could never be like them.
After many years of hard inner work, Isabelle is now trying to look at her illness differently.
“I try to no longer see my glass eye as a disfigurement but as a gift. Because if I didn’t have my glass eye, I wouldn’t be alive. It has saved my life and enables me to discover the world and all its wonderful diversity, meet new people, watch sunsets on the beach, smell flowers, taste freshly baked cakes, read a good book, cuddle a dog and so many other wonderful things that make life worth living.”

Isy
Encourager