Poor Eye Sight

[Zuriel Armstrong]

Over the past three years, I've only made one flight due to cataracts and the resulting poor eye sight. This past December I had cataract surgery on my right eye and it was a complete failure. In January I had a second surgery to correct the errors of the first surgery. It had very limited success. I was afraid I would not be able to fly any longer with limited depth perception and one marginal eye (my dominant eye is the damaged eye). Yesterday I had the opportunity to fly a couple of times and was completely thrilled with the results. I still have difficulty with direct sunlight some maneuvers put you through, but it was a confidence booster for sure

Has anybody else had challenges with vision? And what did you do to work around the problems?

Thanks and I can't wait the compete again.

Zuriel

[Motorman]

We had a guy in our club who was legally blind doing racing pit stops.


MM

[Howard Rush]

Zuriel, that is indeed unfortunate.  I had cataracts.  I painted my planes orange and used orange sunglasses so I could see them.  I had cataract surgery, which worked great.  Then moss or something grew on the membrane behind the lens in both eyes.  That got fixed by blowing holes in the membranes with a laser.  I could see for awhile again.  Then the vitreous humor in both eyes detached.  The visual effect is that of a cat sitting on my head swishing his tail back and forth in my field of vision. I can see well enough for stunt; for combat I'd be seeing a lot of opponents and streamers that aren't there.  The debris in my eye moves as a function of eyeball rotation, and I am briefly blind just at the inverted pullout of the reverse wingover.  I'm getting used to it.  There is surgery to fix it, which I might try one of these days. 

The orange lenses I got were made by Corning and worked nicely.  Here's a reference: http://www.eyetalk.com.au/downloads/files/ET_Res_FAQ_02.pdf .  They whacked off all the short wavelength light, like the photograhic filters we used with black-and-white film to make the sky look dark.  I think I got the 527.  I hope they are still available; I'd like to get another pair.  If you get them, I recommend an antireflective coating.  One caution is that they make yellow traffic lights look bright green.  I had some interesting experiences at intersections until I caught on to what was happening. 

[EddyR]

I had rather poor eyesight all my life.nearsighted. I was almost blind at 52 and had cataracts removed and then I had unaided 20/15 in both eyes. A few years later I had a silent stroke and lost most of the sight in my right eye. The brain puts the good vision and the bad eye vision together and gives me normal vision as long as I keep both eyes open. The good eye is still 20/15. The stroke left many after effects. Selected loss of memory and poor walking gate,balance. I had color Synesthesia before the stroke but lost it. After all these years it is starting to return?
Ed 

[Zuriel Armstrong]

Howard,

I understand completely what you described.  My only problem is, my original surgeon tore and severely damaged the capsule which houses the lens.  I've had a second surgery to suture the lens to the outside of the damaged capsule.  I at least have some vision through this eye now, which helps with the depth perception do a degree.

I was excited to be able to fly at all. 

Thanks for the responses from everyone.

Zuriel

[BillLee]

Have had cataract surgery in both eyes....plus.

First eye: cataract repaired, sight o.k. Then a year or so later, had a detached retina in that eye. That's REAL scary since it is instantaneous total loss of vision! Woke up one morning with the top half of the vision totally gone, like a shade having been pulled down. I was on the table within 48 hours and had it repaired. Now: vision in that eye is 20/20!

Second eye: cataract repaired, vision worse than before. Dr. said I had pterygium, a non-cancerous growth on the surface of the eye that may interfere with the vision. He said that he wanted to do the cataract repair first, hoping that the pterygium would not affect my vision. Wrong decision. Had to have the pterygium removed (a VERY painful recovery, far worse than any of the others!) and then see about the cataract again. As it turned out, he had to remove the original cataract repair and use a different one. Vision in 20/25 now in that eye with a residual flaring effect when viewing bright objects.

Vision now is quite good. Distance vision needs no correction, I wear bi-focals since I need correction for up-close work. Use amber sunglasses (Cocoon brand) over my regular glasses when in bright settings. Don't have my eyesight to blame for a bad pit! :-)

[Louis Rankin]

My eyesight went bad when puberty started.

[Paul Taylor]

Glad your back on the handle my friend.
Come over and fly with us!

[Zuriel Armstrong]

Thanks Paul.  I was out there Saturday.  I flew Lou's Brickhaus Oriental and Don's Banshee. 

See you out there soon.

[Crist Rigotti]

My eyesight went bad when puberty started.

That's funny, it made me laugh out loud!

[Howard Rush]

My eyesight went bad when puberty started.

I know what you mean.  I have to shave before I can hold a handle to fly.

[Louis Rankin]

I know what you mean.  I have to shave before I can hold a handle to fly.

Just the one hand or both?

[Zuriel Armstrong]

I have to admit, I was relieved to find out the surgeon had made an error.

[Zuriel Armstrong]

I have to laugh at it or it really gets me down.  Fortunately, or not, I have Lou to laugh at me too.