Now that I have that out of my system, I can tell you more about this particular morning's bus ride. My driver stopped to greet me in the middle of a cell phone conversation. Technology makes its way into everyone's day in America. This day proved to be no different. Upon boarding the bus with my flashy holographic monthly pass, I said "what's up", my usual greeting, and sat down in the front seat. I reminded my driver this morning's destination would be different. I was elated to not be going to work. The change in itinerary would take me somewhere I had not been before. I read the address to him to be sure he knew it. He said he'd been there before. I was thinking, I wish I had been there years ago. Around 7a.m. I was dropped off at the Callahan Low Vision center at UAB. I was 30 minutes early for my eye evaluation. Upon entering this obviously retrofitted building, I wondered to the information desk. Seeing my obvious confusion, a receptionist promptly asked if I was there for my surgery. I laughed and told her I hoped not. I told her I was to see a particular doctor and she pointed me in another direction. I passed a sea of elderly people whom I guessed were in fact awaiting surgery. Upon arrival at another small desk, a young guy sat like the bouncer of the eye center. Again I asked directions and realized I was in real trouble because he had no clue who my physician was. Back to the information center I walked. This time I approached another person, who instructed me to hang a right, hit the elevator and take it to the 4th floor. Yes, finally some real directions from somebody that really knows something. The elevator dinged and I walked off the 4th floor with 3 directions to choose. I had no idea this was going to be a maze. I struggled to read the signs in the eye center due to the small print they were in. Imagine that, a low vision center with signs in tiny print. So I wondered around. Not a person was on this floor. I was sure the woman said 4th floor. I walked around in circles. It was 7:15am. I started fearing I'd be late. Out of desperation, I fished my cell phone out of my coat pocket and called the doctor's office. To my shock and horror, just a machine picked up.
I made my way back to the elevator about to ride back down for the 4th attempt at instructions and saw a sign that said Callahan Low Vision Center. Wow, I finally made it. Time to relax. No, it wasn't time to relax. There were no lights on. Had I misunderstood that appointment date? Surely not. I took a seat in front of the dark office and quietly pondered where the people could be that ran the place. After about 2 minutes a person whizzed by and unlocked the door to the doctor's office. I sat quietly. She peered over her shoulder before entering the room and confirmed who I was. She apologized for my waiting, and said I was the earliest appointment and they rarely are there much earlier than that. I wondered my way into the waiting room, filled out a sign in sheet, and was told they would get my insurance information later. The doctor's assistant did this interview with me. She asked me who the president was, what day it was, and I started to wonder if I had read the sign wrong and walked into the Alzheimer's treatment unit. She then tried to get me to enter a study that I was not really interested in investing my time in. With that, I was escorted back to the waiting room. By this time the real receptionist had arrived. She was coughing on the phone. I could hear her following some orders between coughs. Apparently the doctor was canceling appointments. I thought please God don't let her cancel mine. After some more casual ease dropping, I learned it was the afternoon appointments only. After a few more minutes, the receptionist escorted me to the examination room where I answered more detailed questions about my health. She was obviously sick. This was the time of year I usually get a sinus infection, so I was not so zealous about being in the same room with her too long. She was nice enough to make every effort to ensure she didn't spread germs to me. After she finished questioning me, she left me alone to have that quality thinking time before the actual doctor arrives. I thought, this day has been in the making 30 years. Please don't let it be for nothing God. Soon the door swung open and a middle aged woman entered the room and introduced herself as Dr De Carlo. I had read online that she was a low vision specialist. She asked me more medical questions and finally got to the point.
What do you hope to gain from your visit with me today? Is there anything you would like to do with your vision that you feel you can't do today? And with that, my simple reply was, I would love to be able to drive. She immediately looked at me with purpose. I feel she could tell this was in fact something she could definitely help me do. She then told me that she would have to do several test on me to see if I qualified. We talked about my vision care and she realized she knew my optometrist. This seemed to spark more zeal, she immediately asked her assistant to get my optometrist to fax over copies of my medical records. It felt reassuring that there was some connection between my regular eye doctor and Dr De Carlo. She backed up in her rolling chair as she talked to me. She was like her assistant: very sick and probably shouldn't have been at work at all. But her dedication showed as she struggled to talk without coughing. She tried using a cough drop, but it didn't help her cough. She said she'd not been sick in the 3 years she's worked at this location and yet today she had already cancelled half her appointments. Now this really made me think more of God's plans. How amazing that I happened to be the person she saw on a day when she probably should be at the doctor herself. I couldn't help but feel gratitude.
Since she had my updated eye information from my optometrist, she was able to proceed with a visual field test. If you've never taken one of these, it's like playing Jeopardy while looking for alien space craft. Your affix you face in a small dome and the doctor controls the size, speed, and direction of light you see. This test how far up, down, left, and right you can see things. Oh, did I mention there's a fun eye patch you must wear. Upon finishing her notes, I waited quietly for the results. You passed. Wow, I couldn't believe that my dream of 30 years had only one more canyon to jump.......a color test. Yes, I was born, color blind. Not completely color blind. Bright colors were easy for me to see. The muted earth tones and colors in the same value posed the most problems. You'd think they would have you look at a traffic light, a few signs, and that would be that. Nope. They had this color coffin. Okay, bad analogy, but it was pretty intimidating for me because it was about 15 colors lined up in this clear plastic tray. These were pretty muted colors in value, so I immediately felt disadvantaged. The doctor took them out of the coffin, and jumbled them all up. She then told me to put them back in the order she had them. I was instructed not to touch the tops with my fingers as oil on the colors would distort what one sees. After that she finally left me to my challenge. I was agitated by this. I thought if I don't pass this last test due to a few stupid color choices I will....I can't think that way, do it Rodney, just concentrate and do this. There is no second chance. I played around with the colors staring intently. You'd think this would be a trivial task to an artist, but not this color blind artist. The doctor peeked in on me after several minutes. I could tell it must not have been too good because she glanced and wondered back the other direction without asking if I was done. Again she left the room. Okay, I've got to get this right. I stared, and stared and moved the colors around a few times more until I felt there was absolutely nothing more I could do to improve my choices. She examined them without saying anything.
Don't you hate how doctors create all this suspense through silence? I did. She said I didn't do too well on that, but not to fear because she had another color test. My heart skipped a beat, and I thought I can't believe all my dreams come down to this color crunching. She pulled out some swatches and asked me to ID them. I was relieved these were bright colors I could easily distinguish. And with that she said I passed the third and final test. It didn't really sink in what just happened. She proceeded to tell me about how there are different bi-optic lenses and frames. We reviewed the samples; I tried them on and took them for a test drive. Once she measured my eyes, I was outfitted with these lenses and she asked me to read the eye chart. I was thinking they were not focused right. I couldn't see anything. She showed me how to focus them. Then she realized I was not tilting my head down. She told me that you must do so to read using the bi-optics. Since you drive using your regular forward vision, the bi-optic is made so it doesn't interfere with that vision. Tilting my head slightly down she asked me to read the chart. Oh, I couldn't believe this; suddenly I realized this was the first time I was at the eye doctor's office reading past the second line of letters with no problems whatsoever! A true miracle had just taken place.
Here's what my new Bi-Optics will look like!
They are mega expensive AND trendy! Right? : )
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1 comment:
What an amazing post! God's hand is truly over you and He is at work in your life. I'm still praying for you!
Welcome to the blogger world!
Erica R.
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