Re: [SkunkworksAMA] Re: JMH's Eyesight

From: Iceburgh69 <walksallroads_at_softhome.net>
Date: Sun, 24 Oct 2004 12:17:03 -0600

I know more or less what you're going through, though not for teh same
reason. I was born with a lazy left eye. My vision in that eye was so bad, I
was legally blind in that eye. As time went on, my eye improved, and now I
no longer need glasses. Everything I see out of my left eye's still hazy,
unfocused, and ghostly. As a resuult, my depth perseption's a little off.
However, I've adapted around it to where I can see depth and judge distance
to a degree. Target shooting with both eyes open with a scope, now that
sucks. Same with using a telescope the same way.

Iceburgh69

----------------------------

  It's more like "something". What had happened some time ago was
 this: because my eyes were not getting sufficient nutrition from the
 body, extra blood vessels were produced in an effort to get more
 stuff to the eyes. However, those vessels were flawed and weak, and
 they would rupture, causing blood to leak between the retina and the
 back wall of the eye. Sometimes the blood would seep through the
 retinal layer, polluting the clear gel of the eye. At first, it
 looked like a 3-D hologram of a lava lamp blob, but as more vessels
 ruptured, it became cloudy.
   Laser surgery was performed numerous times to cauterize the
 vessels, but they continued to grow back. Because of the amounts of
 laser surgery I've endured, I've lost a pretty good chunk of my
 peripheral vision, as well as my night vision.
   The eye normally filters the fluid it contains on a daily basis
(though I think it takes several days or more for it to be totally
 replaced). What is happening now is this: the left eye is by far
 the worst. The vision in that eye is completely clouded due to all
 the old blood and debris floating in the gel. The eye is slowly
 filtering some of that out, and it is becoming only slightly less
 cloudy, but enough so that it allows more light to enter the eye and
 thusly allow more things to be seen.
   Unfortunately, all the previous ruptures and surgeries have caused
 scar tissue to form within the eye. This scar tissue has applied
 pressure on the retina itself, tugging it this way and that.
 Lifting an extremely heavy item could cause the retina to tear off
 the back of the eye, so obviously, I refrain from doing such
 activity. There are a few shadows in what I _can_ see through that
 eye, which are most likely separated slivers of retinal tissue.
 Those cannot be fixed. Think of the retina as a wet piece of tissue
 paper, real fragile and easily torn or deformed. The scar tissue
 has caused numerous folds and wrinkles to appear on the retina, and
 that distorys what I see through that eye. Think of one eye as a
 flat-mirrored retina and the other as a fun-house mirrored retina.
   As the gel clears, a little more vision begins to return to the
 eye. However, the retina in that eye is now flawed, and my brain is
 not able to line up the images from both eyes. This is how you get
 perspective and depth perception. Seeing one object from two
 slightly different sources.
   My right eye has become the dominant one, for obvious reasons. I
 pretty much disregard what is seen through the left eye, though what
 it does see often appears as warped ghost images in my visual field
(hence, why I must ride the motorcycle with one eye closed.
 Otherwise, I see two sets of everything, but they're not lined up).
   So yeah, the vision is improving in the left eye, but not
 necessarily in a useful manner.
Received on Sun Oct 24 2004 - 11:19:08 CDT

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