Floating

I am floating in vitreous floaters!  For the uninitiated, vitreous floaters are little moving dots and strings in the field of vision, inside the eye.  They usually look like little pieces of lint floating on top of your glass of water.  Everybody has them, and everything I've ever read about them says they are normal and nothing to be concerned about.  Right!

On Friday, I was driving to Kohl's in the bright daylight.  There was a hair in front of my eye--or so I thought.  Nothing would make it go away.  I was on the ham radio and mentioned that I had "little black things" dancing in front of my eyes--something my mother used to say indicated that we were lying.  N9XOQ told me that I needed to pay attention because it COULD be a sign of retinal detachment.  On Sunday, everything was cool.  The floaters were still there, but only really noticeable when I was out in daylight.  Sunday, I drove to the gas station and went, "Whoa!"  I had THOUSANDS of little black dots in the vision in my left eye!  I decided right then to stay home today and find an ophthalmologist who could take me. 

The diagnosis, after a thorough eye test, is that I have posterior vitreous detachment, "a normal consequence of the aging process".  Well, thankyouverymuch!  This is not to be confused with retinal detachment, which would be a bad situation, indeed.  There is nothing to be done for the vitreous deal.  The doc said it would "probably" settle down in a few weeks, but that there are no guarantees...and that it could happen to the other eye, too.  <sigh> 

The vitreal detachment CAN lead to retinal detachment, so I am to keep checking my peripheral vision, watching for flashes in vision...and go back to the doc in six weeks.  Truth be known, I needed to see an ophthalmologist after the craniotomy of last summer.  Fortunately, I keep coming up lucky.  The good news is that I'm not going blind.  The bad news is that I am getting old--and I can't do anything about it!!  Like I needed confirmation of that!