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February 21, 2007
Contacts
I'm pretty sure I started wearing glasses about the time I turned 40. I was certainly at least 40, but I don't think I was 41.
The first pair of glasses I had were not the best -- the prescription was a bit off and I had trouble reading things like street signs at night. As a matter of fact I could see better through the cheap reading glasses I got from the local supermarket than I could from the prescription glasses I had. As I'd never had glasses before I just assumed that was the way things were supposed to be.
I think that a couple of things went wrong with the first glasses. One of the problems was that when I went in my right eye was watering quite a bit -- I thought it was due to allergies when, in fact, it was due to the fact that I needed glasses and the eye was doing a lot of focusing work. The other problem was that, at some point before the eye exam was done, the doc said that I had 20/20 vision ... so I sort of quit paying real close attention as he went through his "Is this better or is this better ... this or this" stuff. Hell, I had 20/20 vision -- I certainly wasn't going to need glasses.
And then he wrote up my prescription.
"Wait," I said, "I thought you said I had 20/20 vision."
He said that was true but that I still needed glasses. To prove his point he had me close my eyes and then he held a lens over each eye one at a time. He had me open each eye individually and I could see perfectly -- then he'd move the lens and things would blur up and I'd feel my eye start to focus to clean up any blurriness.
A buddy of mine, an eye doctor, has told me that (I think, and he'll correct me if I'm wrong and he'd certainly explain it better than I'm going to) Optometrists do enough of the is this better or this stuff that it might have been hard for me to screw up that portion of the eye exam. That is, you don't have to be dead on for each of the close ones, you know those bits when you find yourself saying "The first one ... no wait! ... the second one ... no the first one ... wait ... pretend I just sat down -- let's start all over with that eye-blowing thing. The fist one. Definitely. Can you prescribe weed?"
So maybe it was the incredible wateriness of the right eye. I remember thinking, as I was going for that first eye appointment, that maybe I should postpone it as I could barely see out of the watery eye due to my allergies being so bad (the allergies that seemed to affect only one eye).
The point is, my eye doctor didn't screw up. I did.
At my next exam, a year or so later, I got glasses that kicked vision ass. I thought they were bifocals. They weren't.
But the contacts I got at the same were bifocal -- or multifocal. And they seemed to work well enough although they weren't exactly super great. I had trouble reading street signs (like street names), the distance vision wasn't super great, but they were pretty good for a while. As time passed I found I had more trouble reading things like books and my computer and gave up on contacts altogether; I figured my vision was getting worse. I went at least a year without using them and left a box for each eye unused in my office at work.
So, last month I had an eye exam and I told my eye doctor about my wish to wear contacts again. I also explained that I didn't want to be a pain in the butt, but that it might take a couple of tries to get something that works for me. He was fine with the whole thing and gave me a pair of contacts to try.
After two weeks the left eye seemed dead on but the right eye seemed to have trouble when I read from my computer or books -- so I went back to the eye doctor and got a new contact for the right eye ... and then another one as I immediately lost that first one to the floor.
After two more weeks it looked like I'd found a winning set. The new right-eye contact hurt my distance vision a bit, but I could read pretty well.
Armed with my unopened boxes of old contacts I went back to my Optometrist's office. I took the old contacts to make sure I didn't buy anything I didn't need -- you know, just in case the old right-eye contact would now work in the left eye.
The boxes I took with me were, and this may not be dead on but it will work here:
Left eye: .75
Right eye: 1.00
The lady behind the counter called up my records, looked at my boxes, and said:
"The contact you currently have in your right eye is the same one you brought in in the box ... a 1.00. The left eye is a .50, or a bit weaker than the old contact."
So, basically, my eyes are mostly the same as they were when I quit wearing contacts -- or maybe the left eye has gotten younger (I'm kidding). And I've chosen, pretty much, the same contacts I had that I quit wearing because I couldn't read well with them. I obviously have no idea what's going on with my body.
I didn't buy new contacts. I thought I'd use up what I had first.
Maybe I'll find the left eye was the problem all along and that the .75 was creating problems as it should have been a .50, though I'm certain I recall closing my right eye when I needed to read something and I couldn't see.
You can be sure I'll let you know. The story is just ... that ... gripping.
(If I were the kind that went to bars trolling for women, I wouldn't want to do it in my contacts. I have trouble making out features until I'm right on top of next to someone. It has been explained to me -- prior to an evening of drinking so my facts, more so than normal, may not be dead on -- that part of my problem with contacts has something to do with being farsighted ... something something something ... when I was younger I had it great and now all the nearsighted when they were younger and having to wear glasses brats are somehow getting their revenge.)
Posted by delmer at February 21, 2007 8:54 PM
Comments
1. "Can you prescribe weed?"
Don't I wish.
2. "nearsighted when they were younger and having to wear glasses brats are somehow getting their revenge"
I wouldn't have wanted revenge on you because you never called me "four eyes" or refused to have sex with me because of my birth control glasses. (but you did have it great)
Posted by: Darrell at February 22, 2007 1:35 PM