Kathy Beitz: Blind Woman Sees Her Baby For The First Time [Video]

It’s a special moment all mothers share — the first time you lay eyes on the precious little human that is your baby.

For Kathy Beitz, though, the moment was even more special since, as Kathy says, the first baby she was actually ever able to see was her own. Watch the touching video that captured the special moment between mother and newborn below.

Beitz has been legally blind since she was a child and, understandably, she was desperate to be able to see her son on the day he was born. And so the eSight Corporation, which produces special glasses that actually make it possible for legally blind people to see, loaned Beitz a pair of their glasses for the day. According to eSight, the $15,000 glasses “combine a camera, display technology, and advanced computing to deliver a real-time video that enables sight for people with vision loss.” Those who are wearing the glasses are able to zoom, enhance, or alter the image they are seeing in order to match their own specific needs.

“For the first baby that I get to actually look at being my own is very overwhelming,” Beitz says. “Even to look at my husband looking at him was such a good feeling. I got to fall in love with him.”

Kathy’s older sister sister, Yvonne Felix is also legally blind, as both sisters suffer from Stargardt disease, which has robbed both of them of most of their eyesight. She told the Huffington Post that it was her own experience as a mom who couldn’t see her babies when they were born that motivated the family to make sure it wouldn’t happen to Beitz.

“Kathy got to see what my struggles were and the things that I missed out on and the things that were hard for me as a parent. Something like being able to see your baby when it’s born — I didn’t get that experience. When I first tried the glasses, I had a 6-year-old and a 2-month-old, so I still never had those first few moments. When Kathy tried the glasses and they worked for her she was five months pregnant, and there was this clairvoyance in both of us realizing that she never has to experience [not seeing her baby]. She would have a baby, she’d know what he looks like, she’d fill out birth certificate.”

Felix has started #MakeBlindnessHistory, a project raising funds to help the legally blind — including her younger sister — be able to see by purchasing the $15,000 eSights.

“When we finish raising money for Kathy’s eSight, we will raise money for another blind individual’s eSight,” she wrote on makeblindnesshistory.com. “Then another, and another, and another. We won’t stop until every blind person who wants to see, gets eSight.”

As for Kathy, there is little doubt that she sees the glasses as a blessing.

“When I got to see his smile – it does, it does feel amazing,” she said. “And I get to be a part of his smiles and giggles.”