If you were to look at a picture of me taken 6-12 months before I got my first pair of glasses, you might notice something peculiar. You may see me, at 6-years-old, with my head turned 45 degrees away from the camera, and my irises strained at the very corner of my eyes in order to look at the camera. “Why are you looking at the camera like that?” you might ask. “Amblyopia,” I may reply.
Or maybe I’ll be talking to you when I’m exhausted, and my eyes are strained from staring at a screen all day. You may notice my right eye starts to wander off while my left one maintains eye contact. I promise that I am still looking at you and not at wherever my right eye is pointing (though it would be cool to look in both directions). Again, you may ask what is wrong with my eye or why it does that, and I would give the same answer: amblyopia.
Actually, that sounds pretty pretentious. I am more likely to tell you in layman’s terms: that I have a lazy eye. The vision in my right eye has been horrible for as long as I can remember. I got my first pair of glasses when I was seven years old. At that time, the eye doctor instructed me to wear an eye patch over my good eye for a couple of hours per day. This was meant to correct my vision by forcing my brain to use my bad eye. I hated it. It made my eye itchy, I felt restrained, and my dad kept making pirate jokes or asking me to say “arrr.” So, I eventually stopped wearing the patch.
Present me, while understanding why past me didn’t wear the patch, loathes her for it. As a result of my lack of wearing the eyepatch and, consequently, my amblyopia’s lack of correction, I have two very different prescriptions in each eye. I have an eye that drifts when I’m tired, and a depth perception that has miraculously still allowed me to drive. Sadly, this has made me horrible at any sport involving a ball.
Lots of people have told me:
“Oh, I didn’t notice it until you pointed it out.”
“I’ve known you so long I don’t even notice it anymore.”
“You can barely tell it’s there.”
To be honest, I barely notice it either. I have gotten used to my horrible vision and making excuses for it. However, it has taken me a long time to be okay with my eye. It has been a journey to catch a glimpse of my reflection in my computer screen when I’m very focused and see my eye not looking where it is supposed to. It has taken a lot of self-love to realize that people are going to ask about it so I might as well get comfortable with it. While I do wish that I had just worn an eye patch for 2 hours a day, I can’t turn back time. Instead, I can only acknowledge that it exists, and it is a part of me that I will have forever. I’m not entirely to that place in my life where I’m ok with it yet, but one day I will be.