Randomness

Legally Blind? What Can I See?

I've been waiting to post this for a while, because it's difficult to explain this to people who don't experience it.

Everyone who knows me in real life is pretty aware of my circumstances, so I don't have much practice with describing what I'm actually able to see.

Anyways, here goes. I've actually been pretty self-conscious about this, because I don't want people to see my crappy vision instead of seeing me as a person.

If you want to know more about why my vision got worse a few years ago (I mentioned it in the The Real Reason I Haven't Updated My Main Project chapter of this book), look up 'retina detachment'. That's what I've got going on, and Google can probably explain it better than I can.

Vision in my left eye is straightforward; all I see is grey.

In my right eye, I do have a bit of vision still. There is a white film over everything I see, and I don't have any peripheral vision. That means, if I want to look to either side, I pretty much have to turn my head.

I'm able to see colors/shapes, and some details if I'm quite close up. Like, I can see the color/shape of something if I hold it relatively close to my face.

If I'm too far away, whatever I'm trying to look at just looks like a blur, or a shadow, depending on what sort of lighting I'm in.

If I'm trying to look at something on my phone, I usually have to hold it right up next to my nose.

I'm pretty good with colors, but if they're similar, sometimes it's hard to differentiate them.

Like, white/tan/cream sometimes look the same for me, as do certain shades of red/orange or blue/green.

I have a really difficult time with facial features, which is weird considering how intent I am on describing characters in my stories.

I could see this sort of thing a bit better when I was younger, so I have a bit of visual memory, but nowadays the only way I can see any sort of facial detail is if I'm looking at a picture close-up on my phone. Then, I can see the hair/eye color with some success..

As for pictures in general, if someone tells me what I'm looking for, I'm pretty decent at putting together the pieces. If I'm shown something with no context, I may have a difficult time trying to piece together what I see to form a complete image.

If you send me a picture with a lot of white, blue, and brown, there are a lot of things that it could be. If you tell me that the picture was taken on the beach, then I've got some context. With that information, I can say all right, I see where the sand, ocean, and sky are and understand where they meet.

I'm able to take pictures with my phone or iPad (I took my profile picture on here) but the quality widely varies, especially if I'm trying to take a picture of a moving target.

With my covers, I usually blow up the image/text, look closely at it, and have someone explain what they see in case I'm missing a key detail.

When I read/write, I have to do so on a phone or iPad.

So, if I'm writing/reading, I either turn my screen magnifier up to, like, three times the normal size, make the font as big as it'll go, or turn on a screen-reader. This actually works quite well for me, which is how I make sure the things I write aren't filled with errors. :)

This being said, I'm human, and sometimes I make errors like anyone else.

I do get accommodations as needed when I'm in class/on campus, and honestly I've gotten used to seeing things the way I do.