Loosing my vision

As most of my readers know, when my shunt was tied off for three months over the summer I almost lost my vision.  That was an extremely terrifying time in my life.  I think it's time that I wrote about it in case it may help someone else.

I first noticed that something was wrong with my vision when I would see squiggly lines along the outside of both eyes.  Then I started seeing spots and flashes of light.   But it didn't stop there.

One night I was getting ready for bed and suddenly a rather large black bird appeared in the corner of my room and was fluttering towards the ceiling.  I nearly fell out of bed in shock.  The only other person in the house with me was my 8 year old son.  I remember thinking how in the world am I going to get this huge bird out of the house by myself and how did it get in there in the first place? Just as I was about to spring into action, it disappeared.  This went on nightly for several weeks.

Those black birds scared me each time they appeared.  They seemed to be taunting me as they flapped their wings in the corner of the room.  At first I thought I was loosing my mind from the stress of an impending divorce and being incredibly sick.  Then it was determined that I had pressure on my optic nerve and seeing imaginary birds was just a side effect of that.

It got to the point that I was loosing vision so rapidly that I had to stop driving temporarily.  This was unfortunate because this took place over the summer and my son and I were stuck in the house all day.  Walking wasn't any safer either.  At that time I was switching between having to use a cane and a walker.  We couldn't even walk to the park that is just up the road.

At times I would see strange things out of my peripheral vision.  Almost like someone was approaching me or something was being thrown at me.  It started to feel like I was living one of the many horror films that I have watched over the years  I was seeing things that weren't there!

Sometimes at night the only thing I could see was white light.  I couldn't even see my hand in front of my face.  I had such a difficult time maneuvering through my house.  At times I would just go to my room shortly after putting my son to bed because I figured it was safer that way.

I almost can't put into words how frightened I was over this whole ordeal.  All I could think of was that I literally wouldn't see my son grow up, I would never see the moon again, or a beautiful sunset.  Instead I would be engulfed in darkness or possibly just white light.  Thankfully surgery was scheduled on a rush basis and we were able to reverse most of the affects of the swollen optic nerve.  I did loose part of my vision in my right eye.  They think I lost it permanently but we won't know for certain until I go back for more diagnostic testing in March.

When I had increased pressure just over the past few months, I started seeing the spots again and towards the very end the birds.  I never saw the squiggly lines so hopefully no more damage has been done.

I am very fortunate that I had such a favorable outcome.  I can still see that adorable smile on my son's face and I got to see the gorgeous full moon over Christmas.   I feel very blessed that I never seriously hurt myself when I was fumbling around the house either.

When you have a neurological condition vision changes are not something that you should take lightly.  If anything out of the ordinary is happening be sure to be checked out immediately.