Death and Relations Can be Painful

Needles IN the Eyes

Never say what you will not do. If you are alive, life will bring you to a few things; things that will change you, your outlook, and your life forever.

As a young person, I experienced racism in forms that were so horrid; they have affected me even in my adult life. One of them had to do with mandatory vaccinations. In the 50's and sixties, polio, mumps, measles, and chickenpox were real threats to children, and their health. The government did what governments do, that is look for cures or ways to prevent the disease in the first place. Many of the preventions rehired injections. As you can imagine, there were not a lot of Black doctors and nurses running around in the South. So, most Blacks were treated by White doctor and nurses, and most often at the clinics.

One day, my entire school was bussed to the clinic to be vaccinated, and treated for these childhood diseases. My last name starts with the letter "W," and I was most always last for everything. Such was the case on that fateful day when it came my time for my shots and vaccination. Instead of taking her time, the nurse just jabbed the needle into my arm. The needle snapped off, and left the point still in my arm. For hours the needle stayed there until the doctor could come in and remove the needle. No sedative. No pain medicine. Nothing. Crying and whispering for hours, the needle was finally removed, and I was sent home with the rest of the day off, and the message, "At least she won’t get one of those dreaded diseases."

I was eight *(years old. I've been deathly afraid of needles ever since, and even though I know how to take care of myself now, a white woman with a needle aimed at me brings tears to my eyes. In fact, anyone with a needle in their hand for me brings tears to my eyes. I still see the woman who did that to me, and I still feel the pain in my arm. Hatred of needles of any kind remains alive and real in my mind. I know the pain.

Yes, I have had many needles since then. Needles in my gums. Needles in my back. Needles in my hands. Needles, needles, needles, and yes every one of them brought tears to my eyes. Everyone of them reminded me of that dreadful day. So, now, fast-forward to this time in my life where needles play a very vital role in my life and the saving of my sight. Having acquired a disease that I had nothing to do with, age-related macular degeneration (AMD), I must have an injection in both of my eyes once a month to try to prevent blindness, and retain some of my sight.

Every day my sight seems to change. Some days, I can see really well. Other days, I see things moving around, darting here and there. Turning my head quickly to see what's there has become a regular routine, at least until I figured out that what was moving was the fluid and blood in my eyes. Then my sight simply started having dark black spots right in the center of the eye.  The only way to explain it is to say that if there was a three letter word, I could see the first and last letters. The middle letter just did not exist. For a while, everything was pink, and then I could see a purple shape in the left eye. I could not read anything that was less than 14 points. Reading the menu in the restaurant became impossible. Reading the small print in the Bible just could not be done. I was not blind. I could see it. I could not read it because I could not make out the letters. My life was upside down!

My eye doctor assured me that we were going to retain my sight as long as we could, and that had this disease been discovered in my eyes six months earlier than when it was, I would probably be blind already (he did not know God's will for me). This disease in my eyes was discovered purely by accident. My granddaughter came home from New York to renew her driving license. Mine was due for renewal in three (3) months, so I thought I would just get it done and out of the way. To my utter surprise, I could not pass the vision test. Tried it five (5) times. Failed all of them.

Almost in tears, I left the MVA and went straight to my eye doctor. He saw me even though I did not have an appointment. After a battery of tests, he called a retina specialist and simply stated that he had a patient that needed to be seen immediately, and that he was sending me right over. It was 5:00pm. The retina specialist said he could not see me until the following morning, but that I would be one of his first patients.

After the phone call, my doctor, who had become bright red in the face and neck during his view inside my eyes said, with tears in his eyes, I don't want to alarm you, but we have a serious problem here, however, we are going to fight this together!" Now, I am really scared. I was already scared because I could not read the charts that I have always been able to read from the bottom up. The right eye was better than the left eye, but they both were missing the letters. I could only see the big "E" with the left eye. He hugged me tightly with tears in his eyes, and said, "Don't worry, this doctor knows his stuff, and we are going to work together on this problem."

Of course, I made it to the other doctor's office the next morning, and he confirmed that something awful was going on in both of my eyes, the left eye more than the right, but both were in trouble. That was October 2012. Since then, I have had needles in both of my eyes, on a regular basis. January 2014, I went more than a month without the shots. I attended my brother's funeral in Florida, and canceled my appointment. Then I had a crisis in North Carolina, and canceled my appointment. After those injections, I noticed that my sight had deteriorated a lot! I had not paid a lot of attention to the improvement of my sight with the injections, even though things were not moving as much, nothing was pink any more, and the dark spot was smaller, I still could not really see like I wanted to or had seen before, so it was no big deal until I could not see as I had before I missed the injections.

When I returned home, I called my eye doctor and begged for an appointment (the injections are only done on Mondays).  He got me in, and asked what was the problem, as if he did not already know.  I stated matter of fact, I need an injection in my eye now!  He smiled, and of course had to check my eyes to see what was going on.  The bleeding was back and more intensely than before.  I had regressed.  I was devastated, but I knew something bad was going on, and that it was because I had missed those shots.

Since that fateful realization, I have not missed a shot.  I go faithfully, and cry myself through the process, but I go.  On my last check up, a week ago, we discovered that I was seeing better than I had seen in months.  I could read almost the fourth line with my left eye.  No, I can't see the entire line, but I can see a lot more of the letters, and can actually tell when there is something there that I am not seeing.  Do I still hate shots, per se, yes, I do, but I have come to think of them differently.  I actually recognize what happened to me many years ago, should not have happened, and someone should have recommended counseling and/or I should have taken myself to counseling for just that issue so that I could move on from that place.  I did not, but now, I am having to move on to save my sight, and I am glad for that even as I wish that the incident that created my fear had never happen.

Side note.  I told one of my girlfriends of my eye issue, and the shots that I was getting in each eye, and she said "I would rather go blind than let someone stick a needle in my eye."  Several months later, that same girlfriend called me to say that she had been declared legally blind in one eye, and that they were recommending that she get shots in her eyes to possibly save her sight.  Yep, she is getting shots in her eyes, AND she has to have major surgery on one eye. 

Today, I went to see my doctor, and got that needle in my eye!

Never is a very long time, and maybe, just maybe, we should never say never!