2/13/2019 0 Comments My Disabilities: Eye ConditionsI was born with a rare-ish birth defect called Persistent Hyperplasia of the Primary Vitreous. To put it very simply, one of my eyes is a bit smaller and more misshapen than the other, and it had a huge cataract in it when I was born. This was removed, as well as my lens, when I was about 3 months old. I’ve worn strong prescription glasses ever since, and I had to wear a patch over my good eye for 6-12 hours a day, every day, until I was about 10 years old. Currently, I am able to drive and have some use of my bad eye, but it’s very dark and blurry. I was relatively lucky/fortunate/whathaveyou when it came to my PHPV. When I was a teenager, my mother found a support group on Facebook for families who have a child with PHPV. Most of these children had lost their bad eye (the "micro" eye which is much smaller than the unaffected one), and many had very little usable vision. Thankfully, patching and therapy have been proven to improve outcomes for these kids, and many report legal vision later on in life.
Nystagmus is a condition which affects the eye muscles. I was cross-eyed as a baby (this is called Strabismus), but this was corrected through surgery. The nystagmus, however, can’t really be treated. It causes my eye muscles to shake back and forth, which prevents me from being able to focus the image my eye is taking in. It's normally not a huge issue unless I'm looking at the edges of my peripherals or I'm getting tired. Glaucoma is the newest of my eye diagnoses. When I was 18, the pressure in my bad eye rose to around 26 (normal is around 10, and I have a high normal of around 15). It’s currently managed through daily eye drops, but we’re still investigating more. Due to the birth defect, my retina is loose and the optic nerve is all gnarled, so it’s hard to tell the exact condition of my glaucoma aside from the pressure. As always, I'm happy to answer questions and elaborate! PHPV is especially not very well-known, so I'm always more than willing to educate about this rare condition.
0 Comments
|
AuthorApollo ArchivesCategoriesAll Chronic Pain College CPTSD Gastro Life Update SPD Vision Work |