When I opened my eyes this morning, the sun was shining and I could see the world sparkling and clear. It’s been four years since my cataract surgery and it’s getting hard to remember that for much of my life I immediately reached for my glasses before getting out of bed. Now, the world in the distance is visible to me without them!
I reflect on how worried I was not knowing whether cataract surgery would work, be painful, or if I would contract an infection and go blind. Thinking of having someone operate on my eyes was terrifying. Luckily, my catastrophizing didn’t come true and after recovering from surgery, opening my eyes was like putting on my first pair of glasses back in the third grade—when I remember seeing the leaves rustling in the trees and the cows in the fields.
I remember being disheartened when discovering that my newfound clarity lasted only until I picked up my cell phone and tried to read an email. The Monofocal lenses, selected by the surgeon at Wolff Eye clinic, have made reading pretty much impossible. I’ve adapted by leaving a pair of readers in every room of the house. If I reach for a pair and don’t find them, I try to nonchalantly shrug my shoulders and make it an exercise in mindfulness.
When I finished this morning’s daydream, I rolled out of bed. Walking to the kitchen felt awkward. Not exactly stiff, though that may have been a part of it. I felt more like a toddler taking their first steps. Unbalanced. Uncoordinated. Perhaps prone to falling down abruptly. What is going on, I asked myself.
My mind offered up possible explanations. And these explanations branched off into other entirely other possibilities, such as: are the exercises I am doing with my physical therapist to straighten my back changing the way my body is hanging together? Would this explain how different I feel when walking? All I know for sure is that I don’t feel like myself. I continue putting one foot in front of the other, but as I pass by the full length mirror, I notice my head is sticking out too far forward. I cock it backwards. This looks better. Maybe it will soon begin to feel better.
Back in 2020, my vision felt similarly odd after surgery, until I got used to it. It took time and the requisite dosing of drops before my eyes felt normal. Now seeing distance clearly feels like what I do, who I am.
I remind myself that this structural realignment will, as the PT Beth keeps telling me, take months and months to come to fruition. Soon I hope to be walking using my new posture and it will feel just as normal to me as seeing the sparkling sunshine without glasses and reading email with them!
IMAGE: Photo from 2011, Red Feather Lakes, CO. When I spotted this I remember wondering something like, what’s going on here?
