I did not use the boner pills that my GP had provided when I complained to him about sexual drive issues. I know myself and pay attention to how I am feeling and factors medical and emotional that would have me feeling that way. I was pretty certain that I was having drive issues, not dysfunction. My general practitioner waved this theory off and gave me a free trial of Cialis.
I tested my theory before popping any blue pills. I forced myself to watch some favorite porn. On the computer. I used the picture viewer to roll through still images at a pace that allowed them to penetrate the subconscious rather than fixating on the familiar favorites. Everything worked as well as it had before. That proved to me that the issue was not dysfunction that could be medicated, but depressive disinterest. I took none of the boner pills, not even out of curiosity or some dim witted hope that they would make it even better. I am single and unattached, so my disinterest was not something impeding or impacting anyone else. I was really OK with it.
That changed when I did start on an anti-depressant, a generic of Prozac. The Prozac lifted the deep clinical aspects of the depression. My drive returned, but the Prozac triggered actual dysfunction. Off anti-depressants, I had function without drive. On them I had drive without function. Rocks and hard places, I guess.
On 5 October 2009, in preparation for a good opportunity in the afternoon, I took on of the boner pills my GP had given me. It had only been the third time I had taken one ever, and the prior dose had been a month or more before.
On 6 October 2009, a vitreous hemorrhage dumped blood into my eye. I could see a shadow slowly rolling through my sunlight eyelid as I woke, the spread of a thick liquid rolling over my sight, not unlike many old horror movies would have blood flow the screen to black. Opening the eye brought brilliant rose colored vision. The slow flow was blood.
I’ve written about this before, in the most detail on the very earliest posts on this blog in October 2011. I have never added the details of the source of the Cialis.
I doubt that I would have ever asked about a straightforward dysfunction issue with my doctor. If so, I probably would have brought it up in question of the effects of the Prozac. He probably would have told me the problem had nothing to do with the drug, but was all because I am diabetic and solely because I am diabetic. He has shown this attitude about other things that had overlap with the sugar, and he has totally waved off legitimate questions about potential side effects of other drugs he or his office has prescribed, both before and after the hemorrhage.
I point no finger at my GP for my blindness, even though the storm of problems would not have begun without that free sample of Cialis. I blame myself for taking it. I blame Eli Lilly and Company and the other boner pill manufacturers for downplaying and suppressing this horrifying side effect. I am not above pointing fingers, but I never do so casually or defensively. The aim of the fingers I do point is very accurate. I’m not sure enough about this situation.
Blaming my GP would be one things. I can avoid the impulse because I do not believe he had any awareness of the potential problem. I do think that maybe he should have had that awareness.
While I don’t blame him, neither do I trust him. There, I think, rests some friends’ argument that I should look for a new GP.
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Sunday, September 9, 2012
General Principle
OK, so after depressive diversions and digressions, it’s back to the issue of my General Practitioner. I like him. He is a nice guy. He is a competent doctor. I’ve been seeing him since 2005, so he and I typically can deal with each other well. He can be difficult and I freely acknowledge it: so can I.
A couple people that are closest to me do not like my GP. Both encourage me to change doctors. I am resistant to do that because the "interview" process is something I dread, and because there’s no inflammatory problem with my GP. If I dismissed him, I would be likely to go without until I actually needed a doctor. My GP is competent. I just don’t know that he is all that good.
My GP has gained points by being honest when saying he did not know about certain aspects. To me, that is always preferable than someone who pretends to know and makes matters worse through ignorance. He has stated outright that he was not knowledgeable about advanced eye issues past generalities. He is not up on dietary remedies, causes, or alleviation to specific problems. On the upside, he was able to explain things like the eye problems being potentially as much of a cause of vertigo or balance issues as the inner ears can be. Like anyone and almost everything, he has both good and bad points, and the balance is acceptable to me, most of the time.
My big complaint is a glaring point to me. This may sound odd with the general occupation that he practices medicine, but I do not like his fixation on prescription medication. This was a source of dislike for him from the time I first met him while being treated for the broken shoulder. He had told me then that if he took me on as a regular patient, he would want me on a cholesterol medication and a blood pressure medication and a couple other things, all because I am diabetic. My problem with that was and is very basic: my blood pressure reading was in the normal range (~138/78) and he had not tested for cholesterol. I find something wrong with doctors prescribing drugs on "general principle" and not by demonstrated need. This makes me feel as though he is puppet and pawn of the pharmaceutical companies. I have never lost that opinion. I have just tempered it with the certainty that I would never find a doctor with whom I agree about everything
My roommate numbers among those who think I should find another doctor because of the drug pushing issue. The roommate doesn’t necessarily think casual and automatic reliance on chemical concoctions is a bad thing. Because I know my GP is inclined to throw a drug at any problem I mention, I don’t mention many problems and discomforts. My roommate feels I am disservicing my own best interests with my reluctance to communicate issues with the GP.
He’s probably right.
A couple people that are closest to me do not like my GP. Both encourage me to change doctors. I am resistant to do that because the "interview" process is something I dread, and because there’s no inflammatory problem with my GP. If I dismissed him, I would be likely to go without until I actually needed a doctor. My GP is competent. I just don’t know that he is all that good.
My GP has gained points by being honest when saying he did not know about certain aspects. To me, that is always preferable than someone who pretends to know and makes matters worse through ignorance. He has stated outright that he was not knowledgeable about advanced eye issues past generalities. He is not up on dietary remedies, causes, or alleviation to specific problems. On the upside, he was able to explain things like the eye problems being potentially as much of a cause of vertigo or balance issues as the inner ears can be. Like anyone and almost everything, he has both good and bad points, and the balance is acceptable to me, most of the time.
My big complaint is a glaring point to me. This may sound odd with the general occupation that he practices medicine, but I do not like his fixation on prescription medication. This was a source of dislike for him from the time I first met him while being treated for the broken shoulder. He had told me then that if he took me on as a regular patient, he would want me on a cholesterol medication and a blood pressure medication and a couple other things, all because I am diabetic. My problem with that was and is very basic: my blood pressure reading was in the normal range (~138/78) and he had not tested for cholesterol. I find something wrong with doctors prescribing drugs on "general principle" and not by demonstrated need. This makes me feel as though he is puppet and pawn of the pharmaceutical companies. I have never lost that opinion. I have just tempered it with the certainty that I would never find a doctor with whom I agree about everything
My roommate numbers among those who think I should find another doctor because of the drug pushing issue. The roommate doesn’t necessarily think casual and automatic reliance on chemical concoctions is a bad thing. Because I know my GP is inclined to throw a drug at any problem I mention, I don’t mention many problems and discomforts. My roommate feels I am disservicing my own best interests with my reluctance to communicate issues with the GP.
He’s probably right.
Friday, September 7, 2012
Cynical Optimism
I’m not surprised the "Outright Ranting" post trigger some questions and feedback, which can be summed up almost universally as "why?!"
I’ll explain that willingly, in part because I knew after writing it, and when posting it a couple days later, that it was not my strongest post. Yes, it "meandered all over the place" and lacked focus. It demonstrated some of the simmering anger, and not quite in humorous ways. It was the product of a bad morning of a bad week in a month that proved stressful. There were problems that just happen in August, and while never happy about such things, I can cope with them OK. The true stress entered into things–and almost everything–from other people, not from the generalized circumstances. Whether flesh and blood events or sudden increased difficulty with electronic things posed by developers I’ll never meet, most people involved in most situations seemed to stand up and contribute to the problem instead of the solution. These precise stresses added to more generalized stresses including another decrease in vision and anxieties trigger by the general turmoil in society that political seasons always seem to highlight.
Basically, there’s been ton of crap coming from every direction and a heightened feeling of loss for things I used to be able to do and enjoy. All this contributes to writing such a diatribe. I’ve written things like that before, but seldom post or attempt to publish them. So why did I publish this one, without editing out digressions and diversions?
The first is the minor answer, and, I admit with some shame, pseudo-commercial. The post that strayed far from diabetes, blindness and Charcot foot has a lot of terms that will lead potential new readers here via search engines. This is not so impossible. Recent Google searches that have led people to this electronic space include "+doctor +dumb +ass" and "getting old doesn’t mean you have to get crotchety."
In part because I get so many compliments about how I’ve been handling the losses and disabilities of the past few years that I sometimes feel like a fraud. I truly am handling things well, but some people have this thought that the handling is effortless. The truth is anything but.
I basically am the most optimistic cynic that most people could ever meet. I concentrate on the positive and on what I can do rather than all the things I cannot do well or at all. This takes more effort than most people see. My roommate sees most of the truth, because trying to hide those things even when home would be more than I can shoulder. It can be hard for him to deal with; I can be hard for him to deal with. That cynical optimism tells me I don’t deserve such a loyal friend.
Here this post could reach the place I want no post, or even writing that would remain completely private, to ever go: into the realm o self pitying drivel. I mentioned in a recent post the forthcoming publication of a blindness story "Through Rose-Colored Lenses." I’ve read most of the stories they have published since the time they accepted "Smokestacks" in 2010. I have found most of the stories they publish to be in the self pitying drivel mold. "Lenses" is a comedy. I need to laugh, and can do so at myself. I need to laugh t myself. My sense of humor, admittedly something often mean and offensive in political incorrectness, carries me through. The principle is the same as that crazy theory I postulated in the "offensive" post that suppressing the darkness of our social anger will only boil the anger to rage. I am neither sexist nor racist, although I’ve been accused by many of both and more, based on my sense of humor. As I have gotten older and more worldly, society has increased the list of sacred cows. I try to make the list into a menu.
I’ll explain that willingly, in part because I knew after writing it, and when posting it a couple days later, that it was not my strongest post. Yes, it "meandered all over the place" and lacked focus. It demonstrated some of the simmering anger, and not quite in humorous ways. It was the product of a bad morning of a bad week in a month that proved stressful. There were problems that just happen in August, and while never happy about such things, I can cope with them OK. The true stress entered into things–and almost everything–from other people, not from the generalized circumstances. Whether flesh and blood events or sudden increased difficulty with electronic things posed by developers I’ll never meet, most people involved in most situations seemed to stand up and contribute to the problem instead of the solution. These precise stresses added to more generalized stresses including another decrease in vision and anxieties trigger by the general turmoil in society that political seasons always seem to highlight.
Basically, there’s been ton of crap coming from every direction and a heightened feeling of loss for things I used to be able to do and enjoy. All this contributes to writing such a diatribe. I’ve written things like that before, but seldom post or attempt to publish them. So why did I publish this one, without editing out digressions and diversions?
The first is the minor answer, and, I admit with some shame, pseudo-commercial. The post that strayed far from diabetes, blindness and Charcot foot has a lot of terms that will lead potential new readers here via search engines. This is not so impossible. Recent Google searches that have led people to this electronic space include "+doctor +dumb +ass" and "getting old doesn’t mean you have to get crotchety."
In part because I get so many compliments about how I’ve been handling the losses and disabilities of the past few years that I sometimes feel like a fraud. I truly am handling things well, but some people have this thought that the handling is effortless. The truth is anything but.
I basically am the most optimistic cynic that most people could ever meet. I concentrate on the positive and on what I can do rather than all the things I cannot do well or at all. This takes more effort than most people see. My roommate sees most of the truth, because trying to hide those things even when home would be more than I can shoulder. It can be hard for him to deal with; I can be hard for him to deal with. That cynical optimism tells me I don’t deserve such a loyal friend.
Here this post could reach the place I want no post, or even writing that would remain completely private, to ever go: into the realm o self pitying drivel. I mentioned in a recent post the forthcoming publication of a blindness story "Through Rose-Colored Lenses." I’ve read most of the stories they have published since the time they accepted "Smokestacks" in 2010. I have found most of the stories they publish to be in the self pitying drivel mold. "Lenses" is a comedy. I need to laugh, and can do so at myself. I need to laugh t myself. My sense of humor, admittedly something often mean and offensive in political incorrectness, carries me through. The principle is the same as that crazy theory I postulated in the "offensive" post that suppressing the darkness of our social anger will only boil the anger to rage. I am neither sexist nor racist, although I’ve been accused by many of both and more, based on my sense of humor. As I have gotten older and more worldly, society has increased the list of sacred cows. I try to make the list into a menu.
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Great Escapes, Thwarted
Reading vision has become impossible, even in larger formats. I need to scan almost everything to read at all, because I can change magnification and distance. Even when the mail comes in, I can no longer differentiate the shape of my name from my roommate’s to know whose is whose.
My brain is nowhere near as addled as some people would have had me believe. I fill in a lot by shape and recognition and color. I can’t see the words, but sometimes I can see where spaces between them are Without seeing the content of the letter, I can usually get an idea of the format and flow of the paragraphs. The more familiar I was with the typical format of bills and correspondence before the vitreous hemorrhage that spurt blood in my eye following a dose of Cialis, the better I am at identifying business from the same company.
When they make changes to format, the senders "blind me" further, in the same way I have recently decried of web pages changing formats. The changes deprive me of cues I have come to rely on.
Reading for pleasure is over for me. I can barely make out authors’ names and titles on book covers, and I’m not sure how much of that is familiarity with the book. The contents of books are lost to me. I was a lifelong collector and reader of science fiction and super-hero comics books. The habit is lost to me. Overall quality had been in decline for the past decade. I am aware that I had been enjoying the new-issue buying and reading less with each years of the 2000’s decade, but I had not yet been willing to give it up. A recent attempt to update myself online emphasized to me that the medium is certainly dying and that maybe I missed the escapism in theory more than actual practice. Still, I tried looking at one of the last ones I had ever bought and no augmentation could bring the words or pictures into focus. This triggered a new bout of depression.
I go through a lot of audio books and applaud Rhode Island’s integrated loaning system that allows me access to almost any audio book in the state. It’s still not the same as holding a physical book. Some things by English or foreign authors make difficult listening if the reader has a thick accent. Some of the classics become "unreadable" because skimming or glancing over the "boring parts and huge blocks of dense and often dated exposition styles just isn’t possible. I’ve learned a bit and finally "gotten around to" things I probably never would have read in "real reading." I’ve explored authors I had heard of and knew to be respected storytellers, but the shelves of esoteric and old science fiction–the field I write in–is lost to me. Much of it isn’t even in print any more, so there’s no chance it would find its way to audio form.
I maintain the mindset that I force onto most aspects of my life. I try to block out and ignore what I can’t do and what I really want, and try my best to content myself with the rest.
My brain is nowhere near as addled as some people would have had me believe. I fill in a lot by shape and recognition and color. I can’t see the words, but sometimes I can see where spaces between them are Without seeing the content of the letter, I can usually get an idea of the format and flow of the paragraphs. The more familiar I was with the typical format of bills and correspondence before the vitreous hemorrhage that spurt blood in my eye following a dose of Cialis, the better I am at identifying business from the same company.
When they make changes to format, the senders "blind me" further, in the same way I have recently decried of web pages changing formats. The changes deprive me of cues I have come to rely on.
Reading for pleasure is over for me. I can barely make out authors’ names and titles on book covers, and I’m not sure how much of that is familiarity with the book. The contents of books are lost to me. I was a lifelong collector and reader of science fiction and super-hero comics books. The habit is lost to me. Overall quality had been in decline for the past decade. I am aware that I had been enjoying the new-issue buying and reading less with each years of the 2000’s decade, but I had not yet been willing to give it up. A recent attempt to update myself online emphasized to me that the medium is certainly dying and that maybe I missed the escapism in theory more than actual practice. Still, I tried looking at one of the last ones I had ever bought and no augmentation could bring the words or pictures into focus. This triggered a new bout of depression.
I go through a lot of audio books and applaud Rhode Island’s integrated loaning system that allows me access to almost any audio book in the state. It’s still not the same as holding a physical book. Some things by English or foreign authors make difficult listening if the reader has a thick accent. Some of the classics become "unreadable" because skimming or glancing over the "boring parts and huge blocks of dense and often dated exposition styles just isn’t possible. I’ve learned a bit and finally "gotten around to" things I probably never would have read in "real reading." I’ve explored authors I had heard of and knew to be respected storytellers, but the shelves of esoteric and old science fiction–the field I write in–is lost to me. Much of it isn’t even in print any more, so there’s no chance it would find its way to audio form.
I maintain the mindset that I force onto most aspects of my life. I try to block out and ignore what I can’t do and what I really want, and try my best to content myself with the rest.
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Power and Responsibility
I never lost that childhood and perhaps childish ideal that people in certain professions should be held to higher standards than "average" people. I hold a number of professions to higher standards. This includes teachers, clergy, police, politicians, and, yes, doctors and nurses. These people, and others, need to recognize the importance of their positions on the people they deal with every day. I’ve never been in those professions, but took my time as a property manager with similar consideration for others. It was a business, so foolish to make any decision that would lose money. In my case, however, it was the business of people’s homes, not just given apartments. While that does not mean I can willy-nilly assign apartments to every grifter who calls with a hard luck story or "demonstrates" their goodness by imploring the name of God or passing Hir blessing with every stage of their needful tales of woe that I personally can solve for them. I looked at that position as having a responsibility to and for the people renting from me, not just the power to toss them out. Multi-page rental agreements can make me look like a control freak at the start, but in reality I just wanted everyone else knowing what is expected of them and me and having opportunity to walk away before entering into commitment.
I don’t see much attention to the responsibilities of power these days. Maybe that has something to do with news trucks hounding then ratting out city workers because they stopped in the city vehicle for lunch or ran an errand in the city vehicle on the way home. That’s a long cry from the days of suppression. Back in the 1987-88 academic year, the journalism teacher of the high school I had attended presented a student’s (not mine, which is why I don’t name names) work as her own to the Providence Journal and allowed the piece to be published under the teacher’s own name. We all know the stories of crooked cops and self serving politicians like David Cicilline. I find all the stories stem from the same root: the abuse of power.
Doctor’s God complexes can ruin peoples’ health and well being. They whine about the rates of their malpractice insurance without stopping to consider why those rates have skyrocketed. I see both sides, and admit that we live in too litigious of a society The beneficiaries of this are insurance companies and attorneys. Doctors and patients alike only seem to suffer for it.
I would think that doctors’ best proactive defense would be to remain conscientious in dealing with their patients, in trying their best to treat every patient as an individual with a unique body and needs that will never be absolutely normal in every regard. There are no absolutes. Nothing can be absolute in preventing malpractice claims; there will always be someone ready to sue when se did not get hir own way. However, an approach free of the doctor’s ego and sense of power over patients goes a long way in decreasing the likelihood of dissatisfaction.
I don’t know how many doctors would actually do this when it is easier and rewarding in materialistic ways to blindly do as the pharmaceutical reps indicate to move new products, but I retain enough of that childish idealism to keep my fingers crossed.
I don’t see much attention to the responsibilities of power these days. Maybe that has something to do with news trucks hounding then ratting out city workers because they stopped in the city vehicle for lunch or ran an errand in the city vehicle on the way home. That’s a long cry from the days of suppression. Back in the 1987-88 academic year, the journalism teacher of the high school I had attended presented a student’s (not mine, which is why I don’t name names) work as her own to the Providence Journal and allowed the piece to be published under the teacher’s own name. We all know the stories of crooked cops and self serving politicians like David Cicilline. I find all the stories stem from the same root: the abuse of power.
Doctor’s God complexes can ruin peoples’ health and well being. They whine about the rates of their malpractice insurance without stopping to consider why those rates have skyrocketed. I see both sides, and admit that we live in too litigious of a society The beneficiaries of this are insurance companies and attorneys. Doctors and patients alike only seem to suffer for it.
I would think that doctors’ best proactive defense would be to remain conscientious in dealing with their patients, in trying their best to treat every patient as an individual with a unique body and needs that will never be absolutely normal in every regard. There are no absolutes. Nothing can be absolute in preventing malpractice claims; there will always be someone ready to sue when se did not get hir own way. However, an approach free of the doctor’s ego and sense of power over patients goes a long way in decreasing the likelihood of dissatisfaction.
I don’t know how many doctors would actually do this when it is easier and rewarding in materialistic ways to blindly do as the pharmaceutical reps indicate to move new products, but I retain enough of that childish idealism to keep my fingers crossed.
Monday, September 3, 2012
Through Rose-Colored Lenses
Since "going gimp" via a vitreous hemorrhage in the one good eye in October 2009, I have done little work with my longer fiction. I’ve written perhaps a dozen short fiction pieces, and have not been very thorough in keeping either division submitted to editors; there’s a lot of detail searching, and that’s more difficult these days, obviously. The blog has kept me writing and given me a small regular audience that seems comprised of both known people and strangers. I do write to entertain and inform, so I am grateful to those who take an interest in these more cerebral parts of my life.
Despite the lessened progress on the fiction side of things, I’ve had some great accomplishment. "Advance Gratitude" and "Welcome to the Konvokashun" were accepted by the publications "for which" I wrote each, first time out of the gate. "A Pediatrician in Wartime" and "The Thirteenth Day on Kurko" each saw less than a half dozen submissions before finding acceptance. Other stories that had more difficulty finding just the right editorial match found homes, so hard work has ushered in some good luck, though not enough to balance the bad luck of my new physical realities.
My latest acceptance is also of a story accepted with only the second submission, "Through Rose-Colored Lenses." Breath and Shadow, an online magazine "for and by disability culture," took it. This same magazine published my story "Smokestacks" a few years back.
"Through Rose-Colored Lenses." is specifically remarkable on the blog because it is, to date, the only fiction piece I have done that specifically finds inspiration from and gives outlet to my disability, specifically the blindness, and the circumstances that started this ball rolling into a personal avalanche.
The story is humor. The editor expressed concern that it may be offensive to some, but I figure if humor doesn’t offend anybody, it’s probably not really that funny. There’s a butt to every joke. The story has social satire, with a particular focus on sex and drugs in ways that may surprise. And there’s farting that will make Stephen King proud. I wrote it with a specific anthology in mind, . I think its failure there was more of a personal political issue than a story quality issue. The anthology ended up featuring something like fifteen or so stories, and only one was by a writer with whom the editor did not already have a personal or electronic relationship. As "Through Rose-Colored Lenses" is an "immediate future" science fiction and not part of the "Sivil Galaxi" milieu I have been putting most fiction attention on, I didn’t keep up on submitting it to editors. Breath and Shadow is only the second magazine to have reviewed it.
Breath and Shadow comes to the web from Maine. They are a free, none-subscription web-zine, free for the browsing at all times and to all readers.The story is slated for the winter issue, so should hit the world wide web in January or so. I’ll keep the readers here appraised, specifically as the story fits into the Blindsided! themes and subjects more than any of my other stories do.
Despite the lessened progress on the fiction side of things, I’ve had some great accomplishment. "Advance Gratitude" and "Welcome to the Konvokashun" were accepted by the publications "for which" I wrote each, first time out of the gate. "A Pediatrician in Wartime" and "The Thirteenth Day on Kurko" each saw less than a half dozen submissions before finding acceptance. Other stories that had more difficulty finding just the right editorial match found homes, so hard work has ushered in some good luck, though not enough to balance the bad luck of my new physical realities.
My latest acceptance is also of a story accepted with only the second submission, "Through Rose-Colored Lenses." Breath and Shadow, an online magazine "for and by disability culture," took it. This same magazine published my story "Smokestacks" a few years back.
"Through Rose-Colored Lenses." is specifically remarkable on the blog because it is, to date, the only fiction piece I have done that specifically finds inspiration from and gives outlet to my disability, specifically the blindness, and the circumstances that started this ball rolling into a personal avalanche.
The story is humor. The editor expressed concern that it may be offensive to some, but I figure if humor doesn’t offend anybody, it’s probably not really that funny. There’s a butt to every joke. The story has social satire, with a particular focus on sex and drugs in ways that may surprise. And there’s farting that will make Stephen King proud. I wrote it with a specific anthology in mind, . I think its failure there was more of a personal political issue than a story quality issue. The anthology ended up featuring something like fifteen or so stories, and only one was by a writer with whom the editor did not already have a personal or electronic relationship. As "Through Rose-Colored Lenses" is an "immediate future" science fiction and not part of the "Sivil Galaxi" milieu I have been putting most fiction attention on, I didn’t keep up on submitting it to editors. Breath and Shadow is only the second magazine to have reviewed it.
Breath and Shadow comes to the web from Maine. They are a free, none-subscription web-zine, free for the browsing at all times and to all readers.The story is slated for the winter issue, so should hit the world wide web in January or so. I’ll keep the readers here appraised, specifically as the story fits into the Blindsided! themes and subjects more than any of my other stories do.
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Caution: Blind Bowler!
Bowling has resumed. It’s one of the last things I can still do at all. Like anything else, I can’t do it as well, but I am lucky to have very patient teammates who sacrifice competitive edge yo bowl with a blind guy who has to cover the Crow Boot with a pillowcase.
To answer the usual and natural questions:
I have enough vision based on contrast of tone, shade and color to see the lane defined. The laminate is a very light wood color and the gutters are dark gray. I started bowling as a half-blind individual with no depth perception, so I always threw a straight ball. I line myself up for the throw and hope it stays straight.
I can see the contrast of the foul line and usually leave myself some extra space. Due to the Crow boot, I can no longer do an approach, so throw from a standing position.
The limitations of the boot are things I have to relearn. I’m not always throwing from a still position. I have to unlearn habits.
My teammates tell me what pins are still standing after the first throw. I try to realign according to pin positions. We hope for the best.
Obviously, I am bowling with some helpful and patient people. That they bowl on a team with me demonstrates good things about their characters. The people bowling for competition rather than a weekly social event aren’t as patient. It all depends on where the individual emphasis is.
I feel awkward sometimes about the heightened need. When my teammates get absorbed in their conversation, I need to interrupt or wait patiently to be told what pins to shoot for. I feel like a toddler on a carousel, waving frantically in demand for attention with every revolution. I don’t see well enough to even be able to pretend to be able to pay comparable attention to the efforts of my teammates or the opposition, and that does trigger twinges of guilt. I firmly believe in all people being equal, with everyone having times when they are a priority. I don’t indulge people who think they are always the priority, so truly hate anything that pushes me in that direction.
I can do as well as I can in part because the nature of it being a competitive sport, the lighting is well researched and planned. Lighting is very uniform, without glare, and never in my eyes. It’s actually one of the more comfortable places for me.
Vision is tougher when I am not actually facing the lanes. People are still shadowy and darkened. Identify individuals more by shape and body language and voice than by traditional ways. I am one of those people who always had a problem with faces, so a lifetime of adjusting to that may have become an asset in dealing with the vision loss. I do not often stray away from my table to socialize unless I am fairly certain who I will be bumping into (which all too often is literal.)
The first week of competition in the Thursday League achieved 83, 102 and 115. That’s certainly not competition for High Average awards, but should be a good enough foundation to realistically build off of as I relearn the sport with my new status quo of limitations.
To answer the usual and natural questions:
I have enough vision based on contrast of tone, shade and color to see the lane defined. The laminate is a very light wood color and the gutters are dark gray. I started bowling as a half-blind individual with no depth perception, so I always threw a straight ball. I line myself up for the throw and hope it stays straight.
I can see the contrast of the foul line and usually leave myself some extra space. Due to the Crow boot, I can no longer do an approach, so throw from a standing position.
The limitations of the boot are things I have to relearn. I’m not always throwing from a still position. I have to unlearn habits.
My teammates tell me what pins are still standing after the first throw. I try to realign according to pin positions. We hope for the best.
Obviously, I am bowling with some helpful and patient people. That they bowl on a team with me demonstrates good things about their characters. The people bowling for competition rather than a weekly social event aren’t as patient. It all depends on where the individual emphasis is.
I feel awkward sometimes about the heightened need. When my teammates get absorbed in their conversation, I need to interrupt or wait patiently to be told what pins to shoot for. I feel like a toddler on a carousel, waving frantically in demand for attention with every revolution. I don’t see well enough to even be able to pretend to be able to pay comparable attention to the efforts of my teammates or the opposition, and that does trigger twinges of guilt. I firmly believe in all people being equal, with everyone having times when they are a priority. I don’t indulge people who think they are always the priority, so truly hate anything that pushes me in that direction.
I can do as well as I can in part because the nature of it being a competitive sport, the lighting is well researched and planned. Lighting is very uniform, without glare, and never in my eyes. It’s actually one of the more comfortable places for me.
Vision is tougher when I am not actually facing the lanes. People are still shadowy and darkened. Identify individuals more by shape and body language and voice than by traditional ways. I am one of those people who always had a problem with faces, so a lifetime of adjusting to that may have become an asset in dealing with the vision loss. I do not often stray away from my table to socialize unless I am fairly certain who I will be bumping into (which all too often is literal.)
The first week of competition in the Thursday League achieved 83, 102 and 115. That’s certainly not competition for High Average awards, but should be a good enough foundation to realistically build off of as I relearn the sport with my new status quo of limitations.
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