This is going to be a long one but bear with me… I’ve always had terrible vision. We’re talking Coke-bottle glasses, contacts that could double as binoculars, the works. I have myopia, or nearsightedness, which basically means my eyeballs are longer from front to back than the average person’s. This abnormal length causes my vision to be awful and my retina to be thinner than normal. Imagine your retina like a piece of saran wrap stretched over the back of your eye – eventually, it can stretch so thin that it tears. At least, that’s how my doctors explained it to me. It sounded dramatic, but I never thought it would actually happen… until it did.
The First Signs
The story really starts a few years ago when my optometrist noticed a small hole in my right retina. It was tiny – so small that she just wanted to keep an eye on it (no pun intended) and monitor it for any changes. I wasn’t worried. It was just a tiny hole, right?
Fast forward to mid-2023, and I started noticing a weird ball of white light in my peripheral vision. It would appear at the outer corner of my eye, shoot up across the top of my vision, and then zip back down where it came from. It happened quickly, and it wasn’t like the flashes or strobe lights I’d always heard my optometrist describe when talking about retinal detachment. There wasn’t a dark curtain falling over my vision either. I brushed it off as nothing.
What no one told me, though, is that there are different kinds of retinal detachments, and they don’t all look the same. Not every detachment involves the macula (the part of the retina responsible for your central vision) coming off entirely. But all of them are serious, nonetheless.
In November 2023, I went in for a routine eye exam to update my prescription. My optometrist seemed concerned. She noted that the tiny hole had gotten bigger, and there were a few more forming around it. She referred me to a retinal specialist, so I scheduled an appointment for the following week.
That first visit to the retinal specialist in December 2023 was quick. The appointment lasted about an hour, but the actual time with the doctor was maybe five minutes. He looked at my eye, checked the imaging, and basically patted me on the back. “Come back in a year. I’m not worried about it,” he said. No advice, no options, no nothing. So, I carried on with life, assuming all was well.
When Things Took a Turn
November 2024 rolled around, and it was time for my yearly eye exam. My optometrist took one look at my retina and her face dropped. She asked if I went to the specialist last year like she’d advised, and I told her yes, but he wasn’t concerned. Her response? “You need to go back. Immediately.”
So, I went back to the specialist, only this time, it was different. This appointment took two hours and involved two rounds of imaging. When the doctor finally came in, he said in the most monotone voice ever, “So, you have a retinal detachment. I want to do what’s called a scleral buckle, and I want to do it in the next 10 days.”
I felt like the room spun. A retinal detachment? Surgery? In 10 days? This was happening so fast, and I had about a million questions – none of which I could form words for at that moment.
10 days later, the surgery happened. It was intense, terrifying, and overwhelming. But I made it through. (I’ll be diving into all the details and the wild rollercoaster that is scleral buckle surgery in my next post, so stay tuned for that.)
I’m now three months post-op. Looking back, it feels like a whirlwind. The recovery process was no joke. I’ve been through moments of fear, frustration, and hope all rolled into one.
My Symptoms – And Why I Almost Missed Them
Looking back, my symptoms were subtle, almost easy to ignore. Besides the ball of white light that I had been seeing since 2023, nothing else seemed off. In fact, the light was so inconsistent that I thought it was getting better over time. (Spoiler: It wasn’t.)
It wasn’t until the specialist told me I had a retinal detachment that I realized my top peripheral vision was… gone. Like, pitch-black nothingness. It looked like my eyelid was partially closed, even when I had my eyes wide open. It was most noticeable at night or in dim lighting. But here’s the scary part: had I not been told about the detachment, I might not have noticed the vision loss at all. And apparently, this happens to people more often than you’d think.
What I Wish I Knew – And What You Should Know
The truth is, retinal detachments don’t always look or feel the way you expect. They don’t hurt, and you might not get the dramatic “curtain falling” effect that’s often described. Sometimes it’s just a flash, teeny-tiny floaters, or a small dark spot. If you’re seeing anything unusual – consistent floaters, flashes of light, or even the smallest difference in vision between your eyes – please, don’t brush it off.
I say this with my whole chest: See a specialist. And if you’re not satisfied with their answer, get a second opinion.
I learned the hard way that not all eye doctors are the same. Some are overly cautious, while others might be too dismissive. It’s your vision, and it’s worth fighting for.
Why I’m Sharing This Story
I’ve sat on this story for three months, partly because I needed time to process everything and partly because it felt so overwhelming to relive. But I realized that if my story can help even one person recognize the signs and seek help sooner, it’s worth sharing. Retinal detachment isn’t just something that happens to “other people”. There are plenty of reasons that could cause a retinal detachment; it isn’t always from myopia. It happened to me in my late 20s, and it could happen to anyone.
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