Blindness is not all about a life in darkness.
Blindness is as individual as the people who are blind.
I for instance am legally blind. I can see light and dark, make out a shadow of an object, but can’t see your face when you are stood a few inches away from me. Some people see nothing, their world is black. We are as individual as you.
So first how did I come to my situation?
I had my first central Retinal Vein Occlusion (CRVO) in October 2001, that was in my right eye and my second CRVO in my left eye in the early summer of 2007. A CRVO is a sudden blockage of the veins in the eye. It is very destructive, and takes away your sight in less than a second. You go from seeing perfectly to blurred vision in an instant. There are drugs which can aid in treatment, I have been on a cocktail of Avastin and Lucentis and steroids for four years now.
The Avastin is injected into the eye at monthly or six week intervals and reduces the swelling caused by the CRVO.
The swelling is the thing which causes the real blindness. The thing which really needs control.
For four years now I have lost my ability to drive, I walk with a cane finding my way around the streets. In that four years I also gained a Bachelor of Arts degree in History and Political Science, so no need for blindness to stop you in your tracks educationally.
So How do I write?
I use software, Dragon Naturally Speaking to dictate some work, other work I type manually and use screen readers to check my work. Technology certainly does help. Reading is helped by friends reading to me, audiobooks and recorded books from the County Library. They even prepare newspapers read for the blind over the telephone.
Going Blind Suddenly can be scary. Time is the great adjuster. Blindness can have it’s advantages too. Only the other day I complained about the horrible Pepsi I had just taken from the fridge. My wife looked, “That’s beer”, she muttered, “Oh! No wonder it doesn’t taste like Pepsi.” I said with some honest confusion. Too bad they both come in a silver can, too bad I like both!
The hardest part of going blind for me is that I can not see the world. I know day and night. I cannot see a flower, a tree or a star. Even the sun is a mere glowing ball. No brightness in my world, other than the bright glow that shrouds the world in a silver haze. I close my eyes at night and I see a silver glow, sometimes I find my self questioning if my eyes are even closed. Sometimes I blink to tell myself my eyes were open.
The monthly shot of Avastin used to work better than it does today. The day will come when it no longer works, I am sure of that. It is scary somedays.
The injection doesn’t hurt, I have a great doctor who makes sure of that. Quick and nimble, it is over in the fraction of a second. Recovery of sight used to take twenty-four to forty-eight hours. Now it never really recovers.
In the end life must go on. Life will grow ever shadier and greyer. A world without color, a world of sound, scent and touch. A world without sight.