I didn’t want to spoil my cover reveal post so I’m writing this separately, and also scheduling it for the next day.
Last Wednesday while at a work planning day, I noticed that my vision was blurry. I cleaned my glasses, checked for sleep in my eyes, took my glasses off to see blurry faces and put them back on again. I looked the powerpoint screen and asked my neighbour if it was blurry for her. She said it was clear as day.
I then hastily made a Specsavers appointment for the next day, thinking I had had some rapid decline in my middle distance sight. I wear glasses mostly for reading and screen and have 20/20 distance vision.
The optometrist was great. He went through the motions. My right eye was fine. When we switched to my left eye, I swore. What’s wrong? he asks and then I explain that I could see the first letter, a blank for the second, the third one was half there and I could sort of see the last letter. That’s never happened to me before says I. He says ‘Let’s forget that then’ and went to look at my retina scan. It showed a full thickness hole in my macular. A full thickness hole in my macular? What the hell is that?
If like me you have never heard of such a thing, then you will understand my growing trepidation. He says you will need surgery. Will I get my vision back? I ask and he says, yes but probably not the same.
I practically ran out of there. I was so shocked and upset. I had to ring later to ask if I owed money. I went looking for Matthew so I could throw myself at him and bawl my eyes out. However, he’d gone back to the car and by the time I made it there the urge to cry had passed. We spent time looking up what the condition was, how it happened and what the surgery entailed. The optometrist referred me to the retina clinic.
I’ll find out Thursday about the surgery and when. At least I have private and some superannuation stash to pay the out of pocket expenses. I’m luckier than some as I can go private. Most of the tests I’ll have tomorrow are not covered by Medicare.
Anyway, I went to the day job on Monday and managed okay. Tuesday was harder but I wanted to complete a task in case I had surgery before I was due back. I only work two days a week. However, while my right eye is picking up the slack, my brain is having a hard time with a blurry spot in my left eye and this leaves me with a headache, not severe, and a bit of nausea. Not enough nausea to quell my appetite for Turkish Delight and peanut biscuits. Yeah, I stuff my anxieties.
The upside is that I can still watch TV/stream. I can type a bit as I’m a touch typist and I can read my phone sort of. Doing the phone is probably why I have a headache all the time. After surgery it is a different story, because they will replace the fluid in my eye with gas and from what i understand, you can’t see past the bubble until it dissipates. Removing the fluid allows for the hole to repair itself.
There might be a pirate eye patch in my future.
Of course, if I can I will keep you posted.
Donna Maree Hanson, Author, Phd in Creative Writing 