Following my trip to Bastrop North Shore Park and on the same day that I arrived home, I started to have problems with my right eye feeling very sore. This is the one that has a “hard”contact lens in it, the left having a regular soft lens. Something to do with reshaping the cornea. Anyway, I immediately went to my Optometrist who fitted me in to their busy schedule, even on a Friday afternoon deeming it to be an “Emergency”. Turns out that the contact had damaged the eye to the extent that it had peeled back the protective layer causing the pain and loss of vision. After examination and treatment comprising of several different eye drops, my Doctor sent me home with yet more drops and told me to come back the next day, which being a Saturday meant that he came in on one of his days off to treat me. My Doctors name is Dr. Tybor and his office is the Oak Hill Eye Care.

By this time, the eye was bad enough that I could no longer drive and had to ask my neighbor from across the street if she could drive me in. Luckily, my Optometrist’s office is only a couple of miles down the road from where we live. This continued for the next three days including Sunday when my Doctor made a special point of coming in to see me. The same is true for Monday although it is a regular day for them. Even so, they fitted me in and I had to implore my neighbor to again drive me in. Secretly, I believe she looked upon this as not only the neighbourly thing to do but also that it gave her another opportunity to show off and drive her new little car, a hybrid Prius that get about a thousand miles to a gallon of gas. Much different from my Ford pickup which gets fourteen if I am not towing my RV.

Following Mondays appointment, I did not have to go back until the following Wednesday by which time, could see well enough to drive myself. Luckily for me, the eye is healing slowly but surely with a little better vision each day. The Doctor has told me that it will probably take a month or more to get even close to normal.

The outcome of this is that I will no longer wear contact lenses and will go back to wearing glasses. I will need a new prescription as the ones I am currently using are not quite strong enough. They do the job but could use a boost. One thing I have discovered or rather had it brought home to me is not to drive after dark as the headlights from the oncoming traffic proved to be a major distraction. Means I need to plan out my day much more carefully in the future. Same will be especially true when we hit the road full time.

Eyes and vision are something that most of us take for granted and it is not until something goes wrong that we realize just how important our eyes are. I can’t imagine the adjustment that going blind is to a person especially if it is a sudden blindness. Relatively simple things like going grocery shopping and other things that we take for granted, are suddenly no longer available for us and we have to rely on others for help. For us that have spent a lot of our lives living independently of others, it comes especially hard.

Friends, look after your vision. What you were born with is all you will ever have.
Be on the lookout for my next blog. It will describe how I removed the couch from the RV and replaced it with a work desk.

Written 11/24/2020