June Bretherton is a writer, teacher, disability consultant and access auditor who lost her sight in 1984, when she was 42-years old, as a combination of retinitis pigmentosa, glaucoma, nystagamus and age-related macular degeneration.

June in her own words:

I was born 75 years ago in a farmhouse in the Essex village of Potters Street (now part of Harlow). I spent much of my childhood there with my grandparents.  I was an only child and lived the rest of the time with my parents in their house in Dagenham as my father had a responsible job at the Gas Products works.

Despite finding I had poor sight at an early age, I went to the local school and then to a Technical School where I worked hard, got good grades and grew in confidence through being a prefect and an all-round chorister and musician.  Leaving school, I studied music for two years before working as a supply teacher thus proving that this would be a possible career for me.  I got a place at training college and worked for seven years as a teacher, specialising in children with learning issues.

I met my husband at college and we had a daughter, Theresa.  My sight deteriorated, and I needed to rely upon other mothers to take her to school but in return I gave their children extra lessons.

My sight went totally in 1984.

I began to give fundraising talks for the RNIB (Royal National Institute of Blind People) and to run classes on visual impairment for several colleges around the country.  I accepted several voluntary positions on different charitable trusts.

In 1995 I got a paid job as manager of an exhibition in London which then transferred to Manchester and Glasgow, requiring me to relocate with my guide dog for six months each.  These years were the highlight of my working life, but my husband and I grew apart and I finally moved out in 2000 to a flat in East London where I lived for the next nine years.

Whilst working in Manchester, I met a younger man named David who I trained to become my co-partner in my now flourishing business.  He is also sight impaired but has an engineering background and brings different skills to our work.  We both moved to our current home in Harwich and married in 2016 on my birthday and we are both still working, David doing our university training and I concentrating on being an expert witness in legal cases.  Since moving here I found a more artistic streak and began to write fiction books, now numbering nearly thirty.