Eye Aye
On Saturday I finally went for my eye test. I’ve got the system worked out now.
They send a reminder at around two years. It’s important to ignore this one. After a couple more weeks they send another reminder with a voucher attached for a £5 eye test. Hooray! I save £17.50!
Well, technically I save my work £17.50 because they pay (I spend all day staring at a pair of computer monitors – yes, I get two monitors because I’m just that good :-)).
But I save money all the same – it’s the principal of the thing.
I got a bit of a shock. Not my prescription – my eyes have remained “stable”. Apparently very short-sighted people (i.e. me) are at increased risk of detached retinas.
What? What!
Why has nobody mentioned this before?
The optician took pictures of my eyes and looked at them using a microscope gizmo with a massively bright supernova-like light in it. When I could see again she told me that she could see stretch marks around the edges of my retinas.
Stretch marks! On my eyeballs! Whaaaat! If there’s one place there shouldn’t be stretch marks, it’s in my eyeballs.
This is apparently quite normal in very short-sighted people. I’m afraid to nod my head now in case my retinas suddenly fall off.
She advised me to avoid extreme sports. I asked her if I looked like the sort of person who did extreme sports? Or, indeed, any sports? Does covering a pizza with half a bottle of Tabasco sauce and then scoffing the whole thing down count as an extreme sport, I wonder? Could the heat from the Tabasco cause my retinas to fly out of my head?
I’ll have to remember to be careful of my eyes the next time I go base-jumping, parachuting or bungee jumping.
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Friday Fictioneers
draliman on life 
Ignorance is bliss.Keep away from optitians. Be happy!!
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I have actually been thinking that I would have been happier not knowing (the chances are incredibly small)!
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I instantly thought of Sammy Davis Junior…
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Heh heh 🙂
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Truly, we aren’t the Extreme Sports people 🙂 I don’t do whole pizzas, but I sure do stretchy eyeballs. The good news? As we get older, our nearsightness decreases. The bad news? The ability of our eyes to adapt to different distances decreases so we need different prescriptions for each thing we do. I have computer glasses, *seeing* glasses, prescription sunglasses and reading glasses (which I don’t use — reading is easier without glasses). I wear my *middle vision/computer glasses* unless I’m taking pictures, watching a movie, or driving. Otherwise, middle vision is what I mainly need and tri-focals are annoying.
The guys who get TWO monitors are real computer jocks. The Big Guns of the high tech world 🙂 So you must be important!
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I have noticed that my eyes have hardly changed during the last several years – in fact, at one test one of my eyes was slightly better!
My dad now has glasses with prisms in so he can see at various distances, and he started out short-sighted only. We shall have to see how things progress with my eyes as I get older.
Not only do I have two monitors, but they’re pretty big as well!
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Okay this made me laugh out loud. You reminded me that I really need to get my eyes examined.
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My boss and my optician were both hassling me. I decided to bow to popular opinion and just get it over with!
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The last thing I need is another body part that can acquire stretch marks. Making an appointment now for my eye check…
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Heh heh! Yeah, who knew?
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YAY DOODLE! Thanks for this post. Had an unbelievable shitty but this made laugh out loud.. hmmm I’ve kept my contacts in for a year now.. it might be time to pay a visit too…
Btw.. I love what you studied.. no idea what is about.. but it sounds like le coolest!
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I’m glad I managed to cheer up your day 🙂
The optician tried to sell me on the idea of contacts but I just told her I’d think about it – been there, done that and didn’t like them (though back in ye olden days 20 years ago I had to use rigid contacts – they can do my prescription in the soft contacts nowadays which wouldn’t be so bad).
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I know exactly what you mean 🙂
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🙂
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Uh oh,.. I am slightly near-sighted, so now I have to worry about those stretch marks! I’d hate to have my youthful figure ruined by old looking eyeballs!
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Old-looking eyeballs are a real turn off!
According to my research, you’re OK until your eyes reach around -6.0 thingumies (which is quite significantly short-sighted). Mine got there ages ago 😦
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As if I didn’t have enough stretch marks to worry about, now there are stretch marks for retinas, too. What will it be next???
Anyway, you just reminded me that I need to have my eyes checked. I do it every year, although it doesn’t mean I actually get the prescriptions that I need. But I guess I have to now if I need to see where I’m driving…
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It’s always good to be able to see the road ahead (both literally and figuratively)!
I didn’t get new glasses this time. That’s a good saving of a couple of hundred quid 🙂
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Which one is which – is short sighted when you can see close up okay and distance is blurry or the other way around? I have to wear glasses to see things at a distance (although I don’t wear them as much as I should because it’s not that bad), does that mean I may get stretch marks on my eyeballs??? I have enough stretch marks on my body as it is without adding my eyeballs into the equation. Would exercises help????
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Short sighted is when you can’t see at a distance. However, you have to be really short-sighted to have an issue – the figure I saw quoted was -6 or worse (one of my eyes is over -7!).
So I think you’ll be OK (if I take my glasses off everything over 10cm away gets blurry).
I don’t think eye exercises will help with this particular problem 😦
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Okay, so I’m not there yet. But you be careful with your eyes. Keep them tightly closed when you sneeze and no sudden violent movements of your head.
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Sounds like a good plan.
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I know it’s not funny, but I’m DYING laughing over this post!! I find the word “eyeball” very funny in general (no clue, why!) and your mention of eyeball and stretchy has me imagining all sorts of rubbery wierd circles bouncing off the walls! hahahahaha and then someone goes and mentions sammy davis, jr! Too freakin’ much, dude!
hahahahahahahaha!
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It’s OK – it was supposed to be funny 🙂
I also think “eyeball” sounds funny which I why I used it rather than “eye”. I have a feeling, though, that while a detached retina is fixable, eyeballs flying out and bouncing off walls is probably permanent 😦
I’m so glad you enjoyed my post – it sounds like it had the desired humorous effect!
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OMG! hahahahahaha I just noticed the title! Eye Aye!
all i can say is Eye-yi-yi!!!!
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I usually have problems thinking up a decent title, but this one was a gift 🙂
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I loved reading about your “possible detached retina.” It brings to mind my last eye exam, when I was told I had a “wrinkle in my retina.” Did you ever hear of that? So, I had to announce to all my friends and family that I had “a wrinkle in my retina.” It sounds almost musical, doesn’t it? I have never heard of such a thing; however, unlike your response, I am not afraid to shake or nod my head, and, since I don’t do sports, I’m living life according to ME.
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No, I’ve not heard of a wrinkle in the retina. I’ve just looked it up though, so now I know what it is.
I’m glad you’re not letting it a affect your life. To be honest, I’ll hear about something and worry about it for a couple of days, then forget about it so everything’s back to normal for me!
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I would trade a couple of other unsightly stretch marks located elsewhere for a few on my eyes, I think. 😀
Here’s to the continued health of your eyes ~ that’s always the most bothersome place to get any sort of medical issue, isn’t it?
~Andrea<3
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It’s certainly the last place I want a doctor poking a scalpel. Well, almost the last 😉
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I was warned about the dangers of detached retinas, too. I wrote a post, 2 yrs ago, about the weird experience of seeing inside my own eyeball while they did all those tests. I was told that if I start seeing flashing lights around the periphery of my vision, it’s a retina-detaching emergency. They didn’t tell me about not doing extreme sports though – perhaps they sensed there was no danger of that. The most extreme I get is using the exercise bike at the gym, and so far, my retinas have stayed in their sockets.
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They warned me about the flashing lights as well. I think the warning about extreme sports (they also mentioned contact sports) was just that a sudden blow to the head wouldn’t be helpful in the old “retinas staying put” department.
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