Robert Forde
Blind, Not Broken.
Hi, I’m Robbie.
I lost my sight as a teenager due to a brain tumour, but I never lost my sense of purpose.
Today, I speak to schools, businesses, and community groups across Ireland about navigating life’s toughest challenges with grit, humour and a refusal to give up.
What I Talk About
Living with a disability in a world that often looks the other way
Building resilience when life hits hard
Choosing joy and meaning over fear and limitation
My presentations are powerfully positive, enlightening, educational, engaging and highly entertaining. They can be suited to any age group. Whether it is a company conference, workshop, summer BBQ or Christmas party, school disability awareness day, or a teachers’ convention.
Testimonials
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Shane Byrne
Realt Nua
Robert Forde is an amazing young man who agreed to come and talk to a group I was teaching. The group were on a substance stabilization programme and many of them had spent time in prison and felt that they had messed up and there was no hope for them.
He spoke about his experience of losing his sight and all the ups and downs that he went through. He was engaging and funny and the group really liked him and definitely benefited from his motivational speech.
Every student took away something positive from the session and I would highly recommend him as an inspirational speaker for any group.
The thing that really struck me was what an ordinary bloke he was, he was really sound and had a gas sense of humour. It made me think twice about labelling people with disabilities and it was great being able to ask him any question we wanted.
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Sharon Lyons
National Council for the Blind
Robbie Forde comes across as a practical, humble, down to earth, friendly guy, with a lot of love and respect for his friends and family. Then you hear about the shocking ordeal that he went through, and then went through again, and again!
He is still that practical, humble, down to earth, friendly guy. But then also he brings with him a hope that, even when faced with the worse of barriers in life, it is not only possible to get through them all with sanity intact, but also to keep smiling and joking along the way.
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Eleanor Parks
Realt Nua
Robbie was as sound as a pound, a great laugh and an ordinary fella, he said we all get dealt a deck of cards and it depends on how we play them.
He made me realise that if you put your mind to doing something that you can do it even if things don’t go according to plan. I really enjoyed the talk and everyone in the class did too.
Robert Forde