After promising to be more attentive and prolific writing on this blog, I appeared to fall off the face of the Earth. I have a good excuse, as well as a fresh journey through grief where no one died and it all ended pretty well.
Achilles had his heel; apparently my tragic weakness might just be my eyes. In 2020, during Covid I was losing visual acuity in my right eye. I’m of that age, and we’d been watching cataracts develop slowly, so a referral for evaluation. Then we moved in the middle of Covid, and re-started the months long process of finding an ophthalmologist. It wasn’t a cataract, it was something called an epi-retinal membrane and needed a retinal surgeon’s skills. More month of following, evaluating and finally in Fall 2022 I had surgery. The results weren’t stellar. I have a full field of vision, but fluid build-up in the critical parts of the retina leave that eye very challenged for reading. No disability, great vision in the left eye. In Fall of 2023 I had cataract surgery on both eyes, all went well and I had the best vision I had had in years, thanks to my “good” left eye. April 2024 and annual retinal follow-up disclosed no issues of concern.
A weekend away with friends and I golfed worse than usual. Driving home I struggled to read small signs. Monday I woke up and struggled to read a computer screen. Emergency eye clinic disclosed seven issues with my “good” eye which had formed its own epi-retinal membrane. Friday a huge amount of laser work was done to reduce the chance of a full tear of the retina in preparation for surgery. Follow up three weeks later and I was nearly blind in my left eye, could read only large test with my bad eye, so quickly losing functions of daily life. My epi-retinal membrane had advanced at the fastest pace my doc had seen in ten years, so I jumped to the top of the list and was operated on August 29th.
After this surgery, it takes a week or two before basic vision comes back. No pain, just inconvenience, physical limitations, some physical irritation and lots of emotional irritation.
It’s been a full blown grieving process on a roller coaster of fear and hope. Losing the ability to drive is minor, but I spend a bunch of time writing and blogging, so I felt isolated. There is an aura of positivity around you, but it’s sometimes hard to feel that from inside the problem.
I preach that anger is a cancer of the human soul that consumes your love of life. But anger is essential to defining grief, so on any great change in life I give myself ten minutes of anger to define what I must or might need to grieve. My initial comment when this second eye epi-retinal membrane was diagnosed was that this was my worst nightmare. Within minutes, I had slapped myself and realized that I had had and survived worse nightmares when I lost a brother to suicide and later our son to a firefighter training accident.
I believe that, in life, we should hope for the best but be prepared for the worst just in case. I know someone who lost most of his vision, and gained enough of it back to function pretty well after more than a dozen eye surgeries. He found inspiration that if I had survived the loss of our son, he could survive the loss of his vision.
Now twenty days post-op, the results so far have been pretty spectacular. I’m rolling back font sizes and screen magnification and writing this comfortably. When this hit, I was in the middle of building a deck, paradoxically I could work slowly with vastly diminished eyesight and mostly finished the deck before surgery. It will be weeks before I can get back to it, but having that project was exhausting and encouraging and it kept me busy doing something. I developed methods to measure and cut accurately without great vision, I adapted. Now that I can see it, it’s maybe some of my best work ever. It kept my mind off the possibility for worse outcomes.
I often say that once you’ve lost a child and figured out how to love life again, the rest of your life will be easier. Even facing near blindness and a lack of function was easier than I expected. I’ve answered all of the self-centered “why me?” questions before, and am comfortable that life is just chaotic and random and lacks evil intent.
I am now building a visual bucket list of road trips to visually spectacular places that I really want to see before I die, or perhaps before another eye crisis makes sight impossible. Because, much like losing a loved one, I know that I can visit memories that have been important parts of loving life even if I can’t touch or see them. It’s important to make those moments happen in your life, to populate your soul with positive emotions and experiences while you can. And, in grief it’s never too late to visit and activate the memories of our loved ones.
I will once again commit to trying to write more often, barring another Achilles issue. Thanks for your patience.
Be well and peaceful, build love in your life, for your life and the lives of your loved ones.