Hi. I’m Mollie, I’m 16, and I thought that I’d share a story with you. I have what I now know to be natural monovision, but I never knew what it was for years, only that if I closed my right eye, distances were blurred, but I could see well up close, and that if I closed my left eye, up close wasn’t as great, but I could see for miles. I noticed this from I reckon about the age of 12/13, but never told anyone, and it was my little secret, as I can see well with both eyes together or at least both eyes open.
Anyway, this story is about how my stupid little brother (he is lovely really, he just gets on my nerves) changed everything. I was just getting ready to go to the school end of term disco, when James came running in the room with his mate Josh, each brandishing a toy gun. Just as I bent down to put on my shoes, James accidentally wacked me in my right eye with the gun. It really hurt. Obviously my plans were now changed for the night and the school disco became A&E, which was a shame, as that cute new guy in my year, Sean, has been looking my way lately and I was hoping that he was going to ask me to dance.
It was a Friday night, so A&E was its usual hellish self, believe me I’ve had to accompany my Mum and little brother there many times, as he is always doing something silly. After about only half an hour, I was triaged by the nurse, but it took another four hours to see the doctor. Luckily there was no damage to my actual eye, just puffiness, bruising and swelling to the skin around it, and I woke up the next morning not really being able to open it. Great, not only do I look hideous, but my right eye, which I use for distance, was almost closed, so I was having to rely on my left eye that is blurred for distances. I’m luckily fairly popular at school, and hang about in a group of other popular girls, and we all occupy the cool seats in our classes, the ones in the very back row. I get into my first class today and realise that I can’t see sh*t when I try to read the white board with only my left eye, but luckily I can see close up, so manage to copy my neighbour Mel’s notes. I’m not sure that she noticed. It was the same in all my classes, and I finally had to admit to my friends that my distance vision has been blurred in my left eye for ages. Luckily glasses are seen as pretty cool these days, and my mate Sarah has just got a really cool pair and received loads of compliments, so I wasn’t as worried as I may have been, but I wasn’t looking forward to telling Mum and asking her for an optician’s appointment. As expected, she felt guilty for not taking me in the first place, but I feel that it is my fault, as I didn’t tell her.
Opticians are appointing about 3 weeks ahead where I live, and there was hardly any point in trying to get in sooner, as I needed to let all the swelling go down around my right eye. Mel was cool in the meantime, and let me copy her notes, so I managed to get by until I could open my right eye again. Fast forward three weeks to my optician’s appointment. Mum also made her and my little brother one.
The optician was nice and friendly, and I had to admit to her that closing my right eye made distances blurred but closing my left eye made up close not so great, but I could see for miles. She was very thorough, and I came out with the following prescription:
R: +0.75 Sph, -0.25 Cyl, Axis 95 L: -1.50 Sph, -0.25 Cyl, Axis 90
It turns out that my little brother, James, who is 7, is a bit long-sighted but doesn’t need glasses as he is young enough to compensate. My Mum is 42 and needed a bit of help with reading, so we went to choose our glasses. I had some idea what I wanted and ended up with a cute hexagonal/round pair in a kind of transparent purple colour as my main pair, and a rose gold round pair as my second pair. Mum went for something a bit more mumsy in my opinion, but don’t tell her, but they looked ok and as she pointed out, she would only be wearing them for reading, so it didn’t really matter what she looked like. Dad, I don’t think I’ve mentioned Dad, wears glasses, horrible old fashioned metal ones that he’s had for years, so I hardly think that he will be able to criticize Mum’s choice.
I was a little worried about turning up at school wearing glasses, but if I’m allowed to say so, I’m not a bad looking girl, and I’d chosen frames that looked good on me and on trend, so I wasn’t worried. Sean that cute new guy in my year, was in my first class, French. Normally I hate French, but this was a pretty good lesson, as I could tell that Sean was looking at me a lot of the time, from his seat across the aisle. It felt good, especially when he was so distracted by looking at me, that he had no idea what Mrs Bloome was droning on about at the front of the class when she asked him a question. I had no idea either, as I was looking at him looking at me, but luckily she didn’t ask me.
Fast forward another week, and we are now an item, and going on a date to the cinema. Luckily I can walk from mine to the Odeon, so Mum and Dad won’t have to know yet. Thanks little brother for helping me to get glasses and landing me the cutest guy in school!