That is so sad try getting eye surgery it fixes it

That's actually what I have to do here at the end of the month. :) I'm hoping I can recover some of my Right Eye after they clean all the scar tissue and dead tissue away and replace it with donor tissue. :)

Thank god well I'm rooting for you

Thank you very much. I appreciate your encouragement. Everyone here is always so nice, supportive, and there for each other. I'm hopeful my experiences can always help to inspire others to know they, too, can cope with whatever life may throw at them. :)

Is your eye fixed dude it's past jan 26

In the case of a success which of course we are all rooting for, aside from your eye being brown again, what will it do for your vision?

The best outcome is I could lose a bit of the haze and fog I see through due to how misshapen my cornea is. This clearing would help me see things with less distortion. I could also potentially return to a 20 / 400 vision level in the right eye, too. I'd be able to see some things a lot better if that were to come true since, at present, I can see only a foot in front of myself. :)


Here's hoping! I'm DETERMINED!

thats a level that with glasses can see perfectly so that sounds like it could be wonderful

More importantly, if it all goes to the best possible outcome, I'll actually be able to see you beyond just a shadowy figure! I really wish I could've fully appreciated your cosplays visually. Perhaps, if things go to best, I'll be able to for when we present here in 2016? *Crosses Fingers*


DETERMINATION!

oh did the texts of them go through i tried to send em a few days ago

I unfortunately have not received any texts from you as of recent. :( Did you send me a text picture? The only one I got was of the one horse you helped care for back in the Fall.

Ya all the cost lay pics I'll try again later

Hope your surgery goes well! :3 hopefully you will be able to have the brown in your eye back.

Thank you. I'm hopeful I'll get the brown back, too. I miss it. Plus, if I do, I may not accidentally scare anyone when I take my tinted glasses off. <LoL!> :)

*whimper* hope that surgery can help you eye out Yosh

As do I, my friend. Fortunately, no matter what, I'll still be able to be around here with you and all our friends. Sight doesn't shackle me from the strong bonds we have. Sighted, or not, I have a way. :)

Oh my D: I didn't know your eyes looked like that :c I hope that operation is a success

Same here. The left eye is lost forever, but the right eye has at least one last chance in it. So, through determination, I'm hoping that the doctor's skilled hands will ensure one last shot at sight.


Fortunately, should the procedure fail, I have technology so I can still pal around here without sight. So, no matter what, I'll be around. :)

well you got my wishes that your eyesight comes back, though just wondering are you able to see anything at this moment?

Most of what I can see can best be described as if you walked through life in a fog cloud. Everything is distorted, shadowy, or without detail. The more light that is present, the worse the "fog" is. It is for this reason I can see approximately 1 foot in front of myself on average.


Now, with a computer, I can control a lot of ways in which certain things come into view. The way a monitor does the light doesn't cause as much "Fog" so I can make out more on a screen with the use of adaptive glasses, adaptive software, and other tools. :)

Well at least you can see kinda

I'm the sort who definitely is okay with taking what I can get. I could be totally blind right now, but I've had good doctors who are determined to learn from me while helping me to get this far. Why not a bit further? And, even if not a bit further, I know a lot has been learned in the treatment of Congenital Glaucoma and Corneal Atrophy. :)


Find the "Silver Lining" and you can better deal with anything that is to come.

I'm sure the operation will remove this leash that's been holding you down.

*Snugs* Thank you, Leon. It's the friendships here that give me the strength and determination to know to not be afraid of what lies ahead.


As a plus, I can say that neither success nor failure will keep me from being able to hang out with you and everyone else. I'm making certain of that. :)

We don't believe it
No matter what we say it's true
Is this our world
Send us a sign
Give us a reason to believe.
We don't believe it
No matter what we say it's true
We don't believe it
No matter what we say it's true

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMHvZXirECc

You might not like this song, but, I think it's nice, at least.

My friend, I haven't really maintained contact with you too well over time, and I'm really sorry about that. I want you to know that I hope your surgery will go with the best of luck and skill of those that are performing it.

I think (and god damn do I hope so) that it will turn out alright. If it doesn't, well... I know you'll make the best of it. You've done just that to keep yourself happy over time, and... and I know you'll be able to make it through, alright? I'm here for you, mate.

You've been there for me more than you, my friend. Just because we don't always see our posts doesn't mean we don't care. We're all here for each other to get through all sorts of weather. Believe me, you've been there all-the-time. It's just how our little community here works. :)


I'll have to listen to that song after my wife and son head out for the day. I'll leave another comment to let you know what I think. The lyrics sound quite inspirational. "Faith" and "Belief" are things in which we can only give ourselves. There are no guarantees, but they do help us to feel more confident when we trust in them. It's truly amazing how simply believing something will work can help us mentally stay healthy while giving our bodies the strength to physically recover from whatever befalls us. :)

Please, take your time. I'm glad that I can help and be here for you, buddy.

As I hope you know I am here for you as well, good friend. *Snugs* I do my best to check out your art, but have missed journals lately due to trying to take care of visual things while I am certain I can. I'll be pretty much all journals and notes throughout February, though. Success, or failure, the eye is not going to be super excited to do anything after being picked on.


Keep up the great art and know you always have a pal in me. :)

Thank you. I'm happy to be your friend~

Wow, i never knew you have a problem on the eyes! I really hope everything goes well on the surgery man! *hug and high five*

That's the wonderful part of being a part of a wonderful, online community where we all get to know each other for our talents instead of other factors that could lead to misconceptions. :) What you said is why I am so proud to be a part of the furry community. We all tend to find the best in each other before learning of anything else that a Real Life "First Impression" could ruin due to misunderstanding. :)


Thanks so much for your encouragement in what lies ahead. I'm prepared to positively handle whatever the outcome may be. I'll also still be around here since there is technology I have the makes reading and responding to text very possible.


It means a lot to have so many friends, like yourself, who prove what I try to share through Coping with Limitations. This being we are all people before the "Label" society can slam on us before we have a chance to show all the great things we can do. I'm hopeful to continue spreading this message for as long as I possibly can. :)

*hug tight*

I actually thought you were heterochromatic at first, but the description made sense. I've only know one person with heterochromia so far.

Is that the condition where one eye is colored differently? If so, I heard the late, great David Bowie was that way.


In my case it is just disease-worn eyes. The left eye actually once looked like a blue-and-grey marble. The right eye was still showing signs of brown until about 2012.


What I find amazing, after seeing this myself, is that I can see at all out of my right eye. I didn't know how covered in dead tissue it was until I put this image under the magnifier tool. It goes to show how the human body can always find a way if you're determined enough. :)

He actually acquired that From a fight where now he can't adjust his left eye's retina, so it looks brown.

You know, my brother's old best friend use to open up his orbital in front of the tough kids at church and school to freak them out, we loved when he did that.

You mean he was able to make his eye look like it was popping out?


Anything regarding eyes tends to freak me out since I've been carved into so many times. If someone asked, "What would you rather have? Heart surgery, or eye surgery?" I'd say, "Heart surgery". The eye is just a bit too personal.

No, he didn't have anything in there, so he would be opening up an empty skull-socket.

I can stop talking about him if it grosses you out...

Ooh! So he didn't have an eye at all in that particular socket? Was it a birth defect? Or did he lose the eye and opt to not wear a "Glass Eye" at times?


That sort of thing doesn't gross me out since, well, I may be able to do the same thing if the surgery fails. So I'll be doing similar stunts to help make light of losing the eyes if I need to have them removed. :)

He has glaucoma like you do, but he lost one eye completely early in his life and doesn't have a glass eye. I think there's some old optic nerve there, so you might not see all the way back to the frontal lobe. He sometimes wears an eye-patch or stuffs some kind of cotton thing over that side under his glasses. (Probably to not get infected.)

Sounds like a good strategy to me. The last thing you want is infection that close to your brain. :(


Glaucoma is not curable. It can only be treated. And, even with treatment, it will win by taking your sight. It got my left eye early, but I have held onto it since, "It doesn't hurt me yet". However, if the surgery fails, I'm going to have both eyes plucked so I am free of glaucoma forever. It's a lousy condition and the cost of medicine, doctor's appointments, etc. is a pain.

He's a good kid. He's always on-and-off about being an international missionary to China, but I think he'll eventually choose that path no matter what. It's a tough job for anyone and its a harder thing to participate than war, especially since its so far away.

(I just commented on your other journal, kinda important. )

Yep, yep! Got your reply and will be checking Notes later this morning when I can fully dedicate time to all of them.


A missionary to China, eh? Now that is quite a trek from the states. Does he attend one of the seminary's? Perhaps "St. Charles"? I've heard a lot about St. Charles. :)

He'll probably go to West Coast Bible college for that if he ever decides to do that since everyone else at that church decides to go their anyway, even though it's a seminary mostly. It's in Los Angles county. As for St Charles. I've never heard of them. Sounds like an English Catholic seminary.

Brave of you to post this. *crinklehugs* I hope everything goes well for you. ^^

Thank you, Ozzie. *Crinklehugs* The purpose in posting in this was threefold. The first was for me to genuinely see what I look like, the second was to show what I am referring to when I mention what I'll be working towards positively fixing at the end of the month, and the third is to help show to all that these wacky eyes aren't what define me as a person. :)


It's hard to cope with a special need / limitation if you feel like the only one out there who is struggling. So I hope what I share opens some doors for people to know that it is okay to be open about theirs. This helps greatly for self-acceptance. :)

*hugs*

I hope all goes well.

I'm trying to do as much as I can to properly prep my body for the procedure. So the odds are at least more in-favor than not. :)


Thanks for your well wishes, TJ. I deeply appreciate them. Moreover, I want you to know I'll still be around whether-or-not the procedure succeeds. FA's, for the most part, simple coding works well with my screen reader. So I know the outcome is going to be good either way. :)

Wait, can you see at all?
Like how do you type on the computer?
I am legitimately curious, because as terrible as this is, it fascinates me!

I do however, wish you luck in surgery to get your eye fixed!

I am genuinely glad my particular situation fascinates you. :) Without folks, like yourself, who are interested in such matters we'd have no cures for so many conditions that are out there. I admire your openness and very much appreciate answering any questions I can. :)


Yes, I can see. My approximate ability to see is at about 1 foot in front of my face. The detail is extremely limited and gets greater with less light and worse with more light. (Imagine how something would look in the fog compared to a clear day. The brighter the light sources within the fog cloud, the more distorted they appear / look more like shadows)


The way I use a computer is through what are known as "Accessibility Tools". If you run a Windows based PC you can experience two in which I use right now. The first is the "Magnifier" application and the second is "High Contrast Mode", which can be entered by hitting [LEFT-ALT] + [LEFT-SHIFT] + [PRINT SCREEN] (Your computer will make a squeak and a message will display asking if you want to enter "High Contrast Mode". Click "Yes" and the colors will invert. You lose a lot of graphical content on sites through this option, but it is what works for me. You can exit this mode by hitting the same three-key command.)


On top of what I just mentioned, I have an application that will "Read" to me what is on a screen as long as it isn't Flash or JAVA. It is called "JAWS" and is made by "Freedom Scientific". Windows has an application called "Narrator" that is like this, but is far inferior to how much effort Freedom Scientific puts into ensuring optimal accessibility for many commonly used applications. :)

Whoa o.o
Thanks for the detailed reply.

I like how you're really cool about this.
I couldn't imagine a life without my eye sight, I wouldn't be able to draw, or see how beautiful my friends are and stuff.
Which is why I hope you can eventually manage to restore some of your sight.

My hopes is that in the advancing technology we have in this world, we can find an affordable way for people with sight loss have the ability to see clear again.

We take for granted something we depend on every day.

-hugs you-

*Hugs Back* It is so true the saying, "You don't know what you've got until it's gone." However, through sharing stories with positive and objective points we can make a difference to illustrate why such things are not to be taken lightly. More importantly is how losing a sense, like sight, isn't the end of the world. :)


Back in 2013, I was coming out of a span of six eye surgeries that took place between August and December of 2012. I returned to work, but my vision had been even more compromised than it had already been and I struggled a lot. Fortunately, a little video called "Snowdrop" came out and made me realize how, after a lifetime of fighting against going blind, how I should stop denying who I am and learn to accept myself as a capable human being whether-or-not I could see.


I then got involved with mentoring individuals on the spectrum, which lead me to start a little initiative called Coping with Disabilities. I got to present internationally on finding the "Good" in coping with your conditions instead of being defined by them in 2014 and 2015. It is likely we'll be presenting again in 2016, too, with other individuals taking the idea and presenting it where they feel they can tweak it towards showing disability doesn't mean inability.


Sorry for the long reply, but I hope you never stop asking questions about what it is like to experience something. So many people avoid me, or stare at me, without asking me about who I am beyond their perceived notions. (My wife can see and she watches people get nervous around me and gawk, I wouldn't know otherwise).


Lots of people here on FA have special needs, limitations, or have something going on that they would love to talk about if treated as kindly as you treated me. That is why I like being here. Art, writing, etc. are great ways to go beyond our physical limitations while expressing our true selves instead of what a poor, first impression would gleam. :)

Whenever you mention JAWS, I think of the bad guy from the Bond films.

<LoL!> I have a friend who has teeth that look just like that guy (Minus the metal)


Interestingly enough, the application's logo is a shark. It's icon is a shark fin sticking out of the water. JAWS is an acronym, but I forget it off-hand. It's theme music, when it initially is being loaded, sounds like it came straight out of the 70s Elevator. :)

That actually looks pretty cool, but also incredibly painful.

I'm glad to hear that you're hanging in there. It's sad to hear that part of the reason for your vision problems is irresponsible doctors =( At the same time, it's really great that medicine has advanced enough to at least allow you some sight, and I'm hoping that your future surgery works out well. I can't imagine how scary it must be. Though from what I've been hearing you've been preparing for the worst for a long time. I know from experience that mitigates the despair from eventual loss - I knew my cat's death was inevitable as he was really old, though I wasn't expecting it to be cancer. We tried to extend his life (the cancer couldn't be completely removed because it was metastasized, and he was too old to be able to survive treatment. The surgery didn't help and he had to be put down soon after. Even though it didn't help, in the end I feel better knowing we at least tried instead of not doing anything. And I was miserable for months, to the point of dissociation and my memory is near blank from between April and August, but I would have handled it a lot worse if I hadn't been mentally preparing myself for years with knowing that he would die.

Anyway. Sorry for the long story. I'm rooting for you!

No worries, Skye. Your story actually puts a lot into perspective. The biggest point being on how, no matter how much you prepare for something you know will happen, you don't know how it will truly impact you until it just happens.


There's also a great reference you make in knowing that "You tried" to save your cat. You didn't just throw your hands up and say, "Nope! Goner!" You knew there was hope and you pursued it. Even if it was the faintest of odds, you tried. It is so much better to try and know you did your best than to not try and always wonder "What if...?"


You'll be on my mind A LOT before and after my surgery, Skye. I still have very vivid flashbacks of when I was going to hunt down the bread knife and use it to finish myself off while I was blind and trapped in Pittsburgh. However, as much as I could genuinely see this plan happening, I saw your icon in my head and remembered our promise to each other. It was then I got back in touch with my real priorities, like a family without a husband and father, to make sure I fought back the mental demons that plagued me so.


Fortunately, this time around I know all the outcomes as well as have proper anti-psychotic medication. Moreover, my wife will be with me for this one. It will be a real game changer having my beloved by my side. :)


Thanks for committing me to such a profound promise, Skye. You'll always be a part of my "Natural Supports" as I never have a suicidal thought that doesn't immediately follow with our "Never give up and keep finding a way to succeed / be happy" promise we made all those years ago. :)