Life, as we all learn, is full of twists and turns. 2012 was a rough year for our health, particularly my wife undergoing shunt surgery in early July to alleviate balance problems. My skin cancers were not fun, but I got through them successfully. I was hoping 2013 would be a better year. Then, bang!
My wife, eldest daughter and I went to a cocktail party last Thursday, with "heavy" hors d'oeuvres, including filet mignon, and returned home at 8:30 p.m. About 9:00, my wife came out from her desk in our master bedroom and said she suddenly could not see out of her right eye. By the next morning---she slept well---she still could not see out of that eye. As it happened I was due that day to see my opthamologist who checks my glaucome every three months. We called him and, of course, he worked her in. It turns out she had a retinal occlusion---a mini-stroke in the eye---which cut off the blood supply to the eye and caused her blindness.
He called a specialist at a North Naples, Florida hospital, who is expert in this field and a friend of his, and we immediately rushed thirty miles south to this hospital. My wife was kep there for a day and a half where they ran every test known to man. Her blood pressure, at one point was 211/71,probably due to stress and trauma, which is scary, and they at once added medicine to her I.V. to control it and gor it down to more manageable limits.
They gave her every test for strokes known to man, checking her heart, brain, carotid arteries: echograms,, MRIs, MRAs---and found her sound with no apparent major damage. Over the years she has had mini-strokes, as most old people do, including me, but nothing life-threatening. so, they can only conclude this was an isolated incident. She is being given special drops for a few weeks in order to try to regain some sight. Realistically, she will never have full vision out of that eye; she can see light on the right side peripherally, and we hope for some improvement.
In 1964, living in the Ohio Valley, I contracted histoplasmosis which is a virus caused by bird droppings, common to the Ohio Vally, which attacks the cornea of the eye and the lining of the lungs. I lost the central vision in my left eye, If I look directly at you, I can't see you except peripherally---and I was left-handed and left-eye dominant. The right eye took over, and I get along fine. i'm sure my wife's left eye will take over.
So, another life change, another example of the fragile thread that holds us in this world.. She will survive and adapt, I know, with her British spunkiness. What's the old expression: life is a process of gradual change and accommodation. Here we go again!
That had to be scary. Losing partial vision is serious, but thankfully it wasn't worse.
ReplyDeleteI hope she get her vision back.
ReplyDelete