I also felt tremendous guilt. It had been years since my last visit to the eye doctor. I decided late last year to rectify that. One visit turned into two and then into three and finally a referral to a glaucoma specialist. Then one day in April, after two and a half hours of various eye tests, the doctor gave me the bad news.
I cursed. The good news was that even as advanced as it was, it was treatable. My eye doctor gave me two prescriptions for eye drops. I needed to take this medication for as long as I live to stave off blindness.
I wasn't just scared. I was petrified. I am a writer and a reporter and my observations are a crucial part of the toolbox I use. I am constantly looking for details, the smaller the better. I watch body movements, facial tics, hands that wipe away tears. I listen for the tremble in a person's voice. I know when someone is lying. I know when someone is hiding something. I know when bullshit is flying my way and how to duck.
Seeing is everything.
The doctor said that if I hadn't come in when I did, I would have awakened one day and I would have been blind.
Every day since has been adapting to a new reality and trying to find the balance between being sufficiently worried and straight freaking out. Some days, the line is razor thin.
About a week ago, I went right over the line into panic. Because I have glaucoma and am near-sighted, my doctor told me I'm at greater risk for something called retinal detachment, which is considered a medical emergency. If you don't get help immediately, you could lose a substantial amount of your vision.
I feared that was happening and that led me to an early morning visit with the eye doctor, two weeks before my follow-up. My doctor thoroughly examined my eyes and found no retinal tears or detachment.
I breathed a sigh of relief, but it was fleeting. I fear the medication isn't working. I fear that one day, I will not see and I will lose my cherished independence. I've been on my own since I stepped onto a college campus more than 20 years ago. I hate the idea of depending on anyone for my day-to-day.
No doubt I have had help along the way. No doubt I have had situations where I reached out for help and friends stepped in.
But I like driving my own car and deciding when and where I will be at any given time. I like taking long walks downtown.
I like wandering. I like seeing the eyes of the people I talk to. I like seeing people smile, how the shapes of people's faces change from one emotion to another, how brows furrow, mouths curl and widen, eyes lighten and darken.
And the nights I'm blessed to be in the company of a woman who wants to be with me, I love to see the shape of that woman's breasts and the spread of her thighs and everything in between.
I fear losing all of that. It is an irrational fear. But many fears are irrational. They don't bend to logic, as much as I try. They don't fade, as much as I try to push them away.
They sneak into my subconscious and I wake up in the middle of the night, my pulse pounding.
I breathe in and out, calm my nerves.
I remind myself that I can still see. I remind myself that I see even more in my dreams and in my imagination.
That the journey to get here was not just by physical sight. That I never could see the curves up ahead that popped up out of nowhere. I didn't see the dips and bumps in the road that made me stumble and fall. I never saw that cliff until it was right up on me.
I never saw the glaucoma that I was diagnosed with until a month ago.
Some shit you just aren't going to see. And there is some shit in the future that I won't see.
The brutal truth is we're all blind. Always were. Always will be. We're blind to the future. We're blind to the past that we don't want to face. We're blind to our faults, the hurt we have caused others, the hurt we cause ourselves. We lie to ourselves too much.
We think we're perfect and invincible and that if anything out of the ordinary happens, it's unfair. We don't really believe in the cliche that life isn't fair.
We're human and being human is messy.
I'm learning to live with this. I'm learning to push the negative thoughts out of my mind and tell myself of all the good things I do have.
I'm not blind. I can see. And what I see is beautiful. I see friends who love me. I see moments of light in darkness. I see myself dancing to pulsating music and I see myself writing poems and I see good people in a world full of ugliness and hate.
I see myself in a mirror, crisp and clear, still standing, still breathing, still here. I see this is enough to rejoice in.
