Saturday 28 February 2015

One of those days

Have you ever had one of those days that shouldn't work, but does?
Taken some years ago
We are wearing our very
smelly emergency ponchos
I had an appointment at the Eye department of our local hospital last week. I was referred by my optician who, I am glad to say is very thorough. As I can only see properly with my right eye you can imagine the niggling worry at the back of my mind when she said "You have the start of cataracts". I had already decided who was going to get the craft stuff and the sewing stuff and the knitting stuff. You get the picture.

Because we live fairly close to the city centre I can walk to the hospital if I want to. So, with health and fitness in my mind and the sheer pleasure of being able to go out of the door whenever I feel like it, I decided to walk to my appointment.

I forgot about the rain.

I can report that my waterproof coat works even though the hood did spend most of the time falling over my eyes so I was in the dark - and even when it wasn't over my eyes the rain on my glasses meant I couldn't see anyway. I enjoyed the walk and arrived in plenty of time for my 9am appointment.
I reported to reception and, before I had taken my coat off or wiped the rain from my face my name was called.
"is is raining very hard?" asked the lovely nurse as she guided me to a chair
"No," I replied, gaining direct eye contact and keeping a dead straight face."I thought it was fancy dress so I've come as a drowned rat"

Beat

and then she laughed, on of those out loud, sheer-delight laughs that does the soul a lot of good. We got on with the eye test and the drops and then I went and sat in the waiting area until I was called for "The Scan".

This simply means they press your chin onto a rest push your forehead against another plastic thing say "blink" and then "Open your eyes wide and Hooold it!" then they flash a really bright light in your eye and as the drops prevent the pupil closing you go blind for a second or two and then you seem to be peering through a fuzzy film.
Then I had to wait a little bit more before I saw The Man.
He was very nice. Told me my sight in my right eye is "very good". I said "For my age" and he said "What deterioration you have is caused by age but the retina is in very good condition and has no other damage."
He then asked about my sight in my left eye so I explained how wierd it is and he said "Well, you have a wrinkle in the retina in that eye. It is not progressive and from what you have described you have probably had it your whole life".
Now that made me feel so much better because it showed that I haven't been imagining things and what I see with that eye really does have the sides squished in. The cataracts are not to be worried about for years he said and I told him that until I am blind no one is coming near my eye. He agreed.
I then said "Well, thank you for that news You've made my day."
"Oh you have made my day" he said, "You don't look too drowned to me"
Apparently the nurse thought my remoark was so funny she had passed it on the everyone in the department - including the consultants.
I laughed all the way home in the taxi.
What? You didn't think I'd walk home too. Oh no, It was raining!

3 comments:

Mad about Craft said...

My Mum had bilateral cataract surgery last summer which was very successful.

Sian said...

To say that I enjoyed reading this isn't quite right...because I had my fingers crossed the whole way through for you (deteriorating sight preys on my mind..)..but I enjoyed reading it :)

I knew you'd understand..

Missus Wookie said...

I'm with Sian - deteriorating sight is one of my worries too but I did enjoy the story and am delighted you were proved right about the left eye and reassured about the right.