August 15th

I am feeling very heard and very validated. I put off seeing an optometrist for literally years, for several reasons. If you dig back into the archives, you will know that my last pair of glasses was kind of a failure. I felt that the prescription was too strong, and when I wore them I got this terrible fish bowl effect. The salespeople at LensCrafters assures me this would go away and I would get used to it. I even tried switching frames. And of course, it did not work. I was discouraged because they didn’t seem to care that I couldn’t function with those glasses. And when your prescription is crazy high like mine, glasses are not cheap.

I brought in two pairs of glasses to my optometrist today - my LensCrafter disaster pair and the pair that I have had since literally high school, because I can actually see out of them without getting dizzy. I explained my situation and why I had both pairs. She tested my eyes. She was friendly and competent and explained what she was doing. And she told me that when she looked at my eyes, the prescription I needed was in between both pairs. As in, it’s true that the LensCrafters pair was too strong. To have a doctor tell me that I was right and the previous folks were wrong felt amazing. I didn’t feel judged for waiting to come in. She was patient with me, and she got me a new prescription for my contacts too, since those were wildly overdue for a change (though not as bad as my glasses). I’m just happy that I am hopefully going to finally have a pair of glasses that I can actually wear again. It has been so, so many years since I have had a current, up-to-date pair.

(And of course because I got lenses, glasses and contacts and my vision insurance is pretty bare bones, I paid like $500 and I feel hella broke now. Ah well!)