spectacles

i was always one of the tallest kids in my class. this meant that i was always in the back of the line up and i always sat in the back of the class. 

there was one year when we were doing math drills, where the teacher would flash problems and we would solve them quietly at our desks. except i had a problem; i could not see clearly from where i was sitting. so i would run to the front, read the question, and then run back to my seat to solve it. i would do this for every flashcard. my teacher found this very odd so she talked to my parents about it and suggested that i get my eyes checked. i did and voila, we discovered that i needed glasses. i was in fourth grade. 

my prescription then wasnt so bad. maybe about -0.25 on both eyes. this just means that numbers and letters are a bit blurry on the edges but you can function without glasses for the most part. wearing glasses in the fourth grade was not cool. i was afraid i would look like a dork. so i just squinted my way out of it. 

bad move. by the time i got my eyes checked again, my prescription was went up to about -1.00 on both eyes. i needed to wear glasses now - for real. it was no longer a difference of SD to HD with glasses; the whole world was a blur and i needed to wear glasses to make it make sense.

every year since then, my prescription had gone up. my glasses got thicker and thicker. it affected my self-esteem but there was nothing i could do about it. when i turned fifteen, my mom suggested contact lenses and that helped - a lot. 

i would still work glasses at home and i did my best to give my eyes a rest from contacts. but the best twenty year-old me could do was not enough. i had a few complications with contacts which resulted to strict glasses only. the first time it happen, i was shook but apparently not enough because it happened again. the second time around, i was so afraid i would not be able to see in the future, i really took it seriously. 

in 2016, i had a check-up and my prescription went up again: -5.50 on the left eye, -4.25 on the right. i was not surprised but i was also not happy. even when i did everything right, my eyes just kept getting worse. this was gonna be my life, higher and higher prescription every time i leave the optometrists office. 

new glasses from Bonlook - Varna in gold.
these are very similar to the pair i wore when i was thirteen - metal and totally round.

a couple of weeks ago, i went in for another check-up. the doctor said something that i thought i would never hear: "i think your prescription will be the same based on the machine tests we just ran." say what? 

so then we did all of the physical checks and tests: 

"can you read line five for me"

"follow the light"

"is number one better or number two? number two or number three?"

"cover you left eye and read line six for me please"

and yes, he guessed right, my prescription was exactly the same. this is the very first time this has happened to me in twenty-three years. this has opened a new possibility for me - Lasik. i can now consider this in the future. 

also, simply being able to use the same glasses i currently have. 

i was so amazed and elated, i celebrated. i went out and bought new glasses. go figure. 

side note: i usually cant wear glasses for too long since they give me headaches. ive been wearing these glasses since i picked them up at noon. its past 10PM now and no headache! it was meant to be.