The Eye Doctor
In the dark room I hear the soft Asian voice, "One or two...one or two?""Two."
"Two or three?" asks the voice.
"...I'm not sure."
"Two or three," the voice drones.
"Three? No, two! Actually, could I see three again?"
And on and on it goes. My forehead sticks to the greasy mask and he flips the lenses again. "Five or six?" I couldn't tell you the difference between five and six if you'd had gun to my head. I listen carefully to his voice to catch some verbal hints to the answer but he's a pro. I panic and blurt out "five" to end the suspense. Surely he realizes that's the wrong answer - I'm on the verge of confessing my bluff but suddenly the room is flooded by fluorescent lights and the mask removed. The doctor looks silently over my file and scribbles in my chart. This is it - the moment of truth. Did I pass?
"Your prescription has not changed."
Another year, another slim escape. My vision is -5.50. This means that I can't distinguish how many fingers my husband is holding up from a few feet away. Without contacts I couldn't leave my bedroom. So once a year I have to make the call and set up an appointment to renew my prescription.
I've been wearing contacts since I was 14. When my eye doctors inevitably ask how often I change my lenses I respond honestly - once it hurts to blink so about every two months. Then I let loose my yearly speech, "I'm so sorry I don't change my contacts enough. I know I'm doing irreparable harm to my vision. I promise to change my ways. This time it will be different. I don't want to go blind."
I feel like the alcoholic petitioning for a liver transplant. Any good doctor would turn me away with disgust but I need these contacts. Yes, I will wear them for 2 months running instead of two weeks. Yes, I will swim and shower with them in. Yes, when one falls out of my dry, bloodshot eye I will lick it and grind it back in. But I must have them. Every doctor so far has turned out to be a push-over and has given me another year's chance. But I know I'll be blind by thirty.
This doctor is no different. After I apologize profusely for my poor habits he smiles and hands me a box of free sample contacts along with my new prescription. Sucker. He'll feel really stupid when I go blind next month and run him over. He totally has it coming.
Comments
:-)
But I can empathize, slightly. My husband has horrible vision and can't see past his nose without some sort of assistance. Once, as a joke I hid his glasses. Didn't go over to well. He lectured me on how it would be poor form to take a prosthetic leg from someone, and how hiding someone's glasses is essentially the same thing. Point taken, lesson learned. I'm sure I'll be blind in my next life.
Optitions charge more for contact exams -> Contacts are disposable -> you can't get a supply of contacts without the more expensive eye exam EVERY YEAR even though it would be more reasonable for a healthy young woman to go every two or three years.
See the corruption? The manipulation?
The perfect hearing, by the way, is totally true. I had it tested when I was in grad school doing my audiology practical, and it is literally classified as clinically perfect. Yes, I am bragging about my hearing because my eyesight totally blows. A girl's gotta have something.
Since I have super sensitive eyes I can only wear them about 4 days before my eyes start hurting. So my one month pairs tend to last me up to 6-7 months, maybe longer, since I don't wear them a full month straight.
I also found out that one of my eyes is smaller than the smallest size of contacts to ensure a proper fit, so that makes my eyes more sensitive to them.
contact wearer too, until I got a corneal ulcer! These things can make you blind in 48 hours or less. I got away with a small scar on my cornea that doesn't affect my vision. Now I wear my contacts all day, take them out at night, and after a month, I change them.