You’d be hard pressed to find someone more excited and passionate about her job than Aisha Hixon, who recently moved to Wiscasset.

“I love my job!” she said, when asked why she chose to be a vision rehabilitation therapist with The Iris Network.

A vision rehabilitation therapist, or VRT as they are referred to in the field, teach people with visual impairment or blindness adaptive living skills that will enable them to live safely, productively and independently. The skills taught are everything from personal management (try putting your toothpaste on your toothbrush with your eyes closed), to home management, to hobbies and communications systems.

Hixon’s grandfather had macular degeneration. She would drive him places and though his vision was impaired, he could tell her when she was speeding. These days, Hixon drives between 400 and 500 miles a week for work and often thinks of her grandfather. As a VRT, she goes to people’s homes to teach them how to be independent within their own home environment. Hixon covers the areas of Lincoln, Waldo and Knox counties and said, “GPS is my copilot. There is no I-95 in my region and I do sometimes commute on dirt roads.”

Many of the clients Hixon works with are older. “There is so much history in the older people we work with,” she said. 

The choice of a VRT career requires both a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in vision rehabilitation therapy. Hixon completed a bachelor’s degree at the University of Southern Maine in therapeutic recreation and master’s degree at University of Massachusetts, Boston. One of the many facets she enjoys about her job is that she is teaching people to be independent, she is not going into their homes to do the task for them.