Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Vision Before During & After
Over the past week I have had an experience where it has been proven many times that we take too many simple things for granted.
There is no question my wife is truly the 'better half' of our relationship. Having been waited on hand and foot for years she is truly the most precious thing that ever happened to me in my life.
She has known for several years that she had cataracts, but they were not too much of a problem and she had expected to have them looked after in due time. All of a sudden in a short period of time her vision went from pretty good to just shadows and extremely bright lights. A quickly arranged visit to a specialist confirmed that surgery was required ASAP and that is going to take place next week. Hopefully that will correct the problem but the risks are higher than usual because things advanced so quickly.
The purpose of this blog entry is not to generate sympathy, but to get you to think about the simple things we take for granted every day. Simple things that affect you, but not necessarily directly. Here are some of the things I am talking about;
1. Can you imagine not being able to set the timer on the microwave? The washer? The dryer?
2. Going for a drive, you have no idea where you are.
3. You can't make a phone call because the numbers are out of place and blurry. (Thank goodness one of our phones has a specially situated direct dial button that I programmed some time ago to call my cell.)
4. You no longer feel like watching TV because the other isn't able to see what is going on.
5. Something dropped on the floor can no longer be found unless the other person is present.
6. You make yourself a cup of coffee, but you can't tell when the cup is full.
The list can go on, but you can understand what I am getting at. It's the little every day things that are so important, things you do automatically without ever a thought.
Sure, there are many people with vision problems from severe to mild, and most have learned to adapt to a degree that I am always amazed. However when it happens to a loved one in a short time frame, how important those little things come to be.
We should always remember that - before rather than after.
This work by NSCAVE is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License
There is no question my wife is truly the 'better half' of our relationship. Having been waited on hand and foot for years she is truly the most precious thing that ever happened to me in my life.
She has known for several years that she had cataracts, but they were not too much of a problem and she had expected to have them looked after in due time. All of a sudden in a short period of time her vision went from pretty good to just shadows and extremely bright lights. A quickly arranged visit to a specialist confirmed that surgery was required ASAP and that is going to take place next week. Hopefully that will correct the problem but the risks are higher than usual because things advanced so quickly.
The purpose of this blog entry is not to generate sympathy, but to get you to think about the simple things we take for granted every day. Simple things that affect you, but not necessarily directly. Here are some of the things I am talking about;
1. Can you imagine not being able to set the timer on the microwave? The washer? The dryer?
2. Going for a drive, you have no idea where you are.
3. You can't make a phone call because the numbers are out of place and blurry. (Thank goodness one of our phones has a specially situated direct dial button that I programmed some time ago to call my cell.)
4. You no longer feel like watching TV because the other isn't able to see what is going on.
5. Something dropped on the floor can no longer be found unless the other person is present.
6. You make yourself a cup of coffee, but you can't tell when the cup is full.
The list can go on, but you can understand what I am getting at. It's the little every day things that are so important, things you do automatically without ever a thought.
Sure, there are many people with vision problems from severe to mild, and most have learned to adapt to a degree that I am always amazed. However when it happens to a loved one in a short time frame, how important those little things come to be.
We should always remember that - before rather than after.
This work by NSCAVE is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License
Comments:
Post a Comment
What's your take? Agree? Disagree? Comment!