About 12:30 PM this afternoon I had taken Guido out for potty and was walking back to my apartment and all of a sudden I had a big black blob swirling around my left eye. It looked like those psychedelic projectors at 70s rock concerts with the oil swirling around. I thought oh shit! A retinal detachment. Called the Ophthalmologist and they said come in right away, as I could lose the sight very fast without some surgical intervention. The tech checked my vision, good, still 20/15 and then a glaucoma test, normal pressure, and a field peripheral vision test, good, I could see all the quadrants. The doc came and examined my dilated eyes and she saw the blob in my left, right was clear and determined it was vitreous humor, which is gelatinous breaking up as that is somewhat normal as you age, but mine had broken up and chunks of it were right behind the lens. That is why I am seeing black blobs and trying to look around them. The doc said they should dissipate and break up. I go see her in a month to check again. Let me tell ya, I really thought I could lose my left eye.
35 thoughts on “I had a scare today, my left eye.”
Hope it clears up without any problem. Gettin’ old sucks. —ken
Oh man, crazy…age does that. I didn’t get the blob, I started getting lightning shows in my right eye. Got checked out right away. Same gig, vitreous humor. Mostly abated after a month or so, but I still get one now and then. Usually occurs just on dark when I’m outside or going into a dark room in the house.
I asked the Doc about it occurring in my left eye…no time line, just when it does get in right away.
The doc asked if I was getting flashing of light, no I haven’t yet or seeing red, red is bad, meaning a bleed…
But that’s a cool look, when your eyes are scarlet with blood inside. The blacks shy away, thinking that you’re a debil-debil man.
Praying for you Cederq. Although we may all see a large flash of light soon but then it won’t matter.
That’s enough to scare the piss out of anyone.
Hopefully Doc is right.
Cederq, you can take my turn with ophthalmologists. Last week I had my 15th visit down to Brisbane for my last review after my right eye got fucked up on the op table in August ‘21, 1000km journey there are back.
The specialist said that he was really happy with the reattached of the macular and retina. So I asked how soon I can expect decent vision with it? Oh no, says he, too much damage to the macular and optic nerve after they neglected to secure my head against movement during surgery. So the op was a success, ut the patient died. Old joke.
Few things would scare me as much as problems with my eyes. Best of luck on the recheck!
Sounds to me like a flashback from a Allman Brothers concert and a handful of shrooms. This place already has its own Mr. Magoo, so you’re going to need to get yourself another form of ailment. You have some experience in that field so put your thinking cap on and let us know what you decide on.
In the meantime, hopefully this passes quickly and leaves you with no permanent loss of sight or additional mental damage.
The mental damage is already present. I really don’t want to be Johno’s doppelganger…
But at least then you’ll be attractive to women.
Yeah…..you don’t screw around with visual changes. Your only issued two eyeballs…no replacements. And if something goes wrong the clock ticks away real fast.
I saw a blue streak one day. Like I stared at a welding arc. But I hadn’t. Posterior Vitreous Detachment. It just pulled on the retina as it shrinks. But the eye doc sent me to the surgeon and I had both sides tack welded to avoid any tears. If you ever had nearsightedness, your retina is prolly weak in spots. Goes hand in hand.
Yeah, yearly checkups to make sure. Got a floater named Blob that I have to live with, but it sure beats blindness.
Glad you got it looked at asap.
Yes, I am very near sighted, have been since I was 7 or 8, have been wearing glasses since then and I am 64. I also have diabetic retinopathy, had extensive laser ablations in 2004, 2005 in both eyes. That was why I was very concerned about retinal detachment.
Then you know the drill. Well done. I learned about cobblestones and lattice. Weird how one issue points to another. praying for you brother.
I was once joking with a cop over wheather he was going to write me a ticket. When he allowed that he was letting me off I said that was a good thing cause I had been set to deliver my meanest curse if he wrote me up. He says, oh really what’s that?
May you live long enough to experience All of the various joys of the aging process.
Welcome to it, I found 55-60 to be the worst.
Take care, Cederq.
WTF,
I had almost the same thing happen from Friday to today. Dark blob in peripheral vision of left eye. By evening it had a hanging reverse J that swung like a pendulum when I looked left to right and back. Over Saturday and Sunday had an increasing appearance of spider webs in my eye. On Monday went to emergency and they pushed my buttons about retinal detachment. Got a referral for today with an eye specialist.
Turns out it was vitreous detachment not the retina. The blood thinner I’ve been on since first of December exacerbated bleeding from the area where the vitreous pulled free. The blood is what I was seeing and was what the doc on Monday thought was a retinal detachment.
I’m off the blood thinner after consults with three different docs today until a followup in Feb.
Of all the weird health problems and injuries I’ve suffered over the years this one scared me the worst until I knew what was happening.
After consideration and review I think this problem must have something to do with reading Bustednuckles.
wes
wtdb
Yes, wes, aggressive blood thinners may be required to treat vascular and cardiac issues, but be responsible for bleeding inside your eyes, especially with diabetic patients.
You can get blood plasma leakage over your macular, resulting in loss of visual acuity. Side effects like these are too common.
Dammit Wes, I’m on blood thinners. Guess I may have to stop and depart from this demented madness here at the old blog.
I really do hope this gets better for you. eyes are one of the few things I would not like to live without. got some grit/sand or whatever in one eye years ago.
it drove me nuts and ended up costing me a fair bit of cash to get fixed and a eye patch for a week. almost as bad. used a week vacation time as getting around was a problem.
it has always been safety glasses after that fuck up.
Good to know this was on the lower level of the concern scale.
Just had the same thing happen to me recently. Doctor told me the same thing…..it happened because I’m old. The nerve of her to call me old.
Funny thing they never tell you in orientation class about getting old and what maladies you gonna have to endure.
Cederq, among other eye problems, I’ve always had acute astigmatism. But I stopped worrying about it when pretty nurses told me that I was just a cute!
Best of luck CederQ.
I had a mini stroke in March 2017 caused by being in AFIB for more than day. I was driving home from a wake for a friend’s mother when a shadow appeared in the upper left quadrant of my visual field and a slight headache. As the night wore on the headache got wwaayy worse.
This was on a Saturday. Called the VA the next morning and asked to speak to the triage nurse. She set me up with an appointment for the eye clinic Wednesday the following week.
One would think that a triage nurse should recognize stroke symptoms when a patient describes sudden vision changes.
When the eye clinic manager, an ophthalmologist, read the report for the appointment on Monday, he immediately called me on the phone.
After reviewing the symptoms during the call, he told me he suspected I’d had a stroke. He set me up with a radioactive dye brain scan for the following day. Results of the scan were positive for a stroke.
I have two dead spots in the back of my brain, one about the size of my first thumb joint in lower right rear where vision is interpreted, the other about 3/4 that size on the lower left rear.
The headaches took about a month to dissipate and I had some problems with short term memory which have since dissipated. The neurologist told me those problems were due to brain swelling as a result of the damage from the stroke. That lasted about a month or so. The memory problems manifested mostly as not remembering where I’d parked my vehicle at the grocery store. I worked around that by parking near a landmark, a specific tree on the parking lot perimeter. I still park there.
They also had me scheduled with a Neurologist who did some testing and reviewed the scans. During the first visit, I asked him if my brain would rewire itself to bring back the missing portions in my vision which was readily apparent to me at the time. He said that was not possible with the evident damage.
Visual field tests subsequent to the stroke reveal that there is some loss and it has remained stable. However, over time my brain is ignoring those lost pieces of visual field. I just don’t “see” them anymore as I did after the stroke first occurred. It takes the visual field machine at the eye clinic to detect them now.
So, as others have said, if you experience a sudden change in your vision, call your doctor or get to your local hospital, tout suite.
From what I’ve read since, blood thinners can be successful in dissolving the clot if administered in a timely manner, if you’re having a stroke.
I have has floaters for years, I find this product Zeaxanthin works wonders to keep floaters at bay. You can get this product at Vit, Shoppe and other like stores.
Zeaxanthin is made for the eyes.
Z, I am looking into that!
Glad to hear you’re doing OK, C.
I was going to recommend an Opthalmic Surgeon in Medford, the guy who did my laser iridotomy, but I just got the letter from him about retiring from practice. Oh well. And if the doc you saw was in Roseburg, she’s likely the one my dad saw for quite a few years. I still laugh about the time he got a letter from DMV revoking his driver’s license. He was livid: “WHO TURNED ME IN?” Well, I’m sure it was his eye docs (he had more than one) as they were liable if they let him drive.
I do hope that your issues remain relatively benign. Keep that followup, even if it seems to resolve. There’s so much more to an eye exam than glasses. I went in for new glasses, and ended up with the iridotomy and an ongoing script for nightly eyedrops to prevent glaucoma. I count my lucky stars that it’s the only prescription med I am on.
Like Igor, and a few others here, I turn the big seven-oh in April, so I’ll qualify for true “geezer” status, as a recent comment from Nemo had it.
Greg, I am seeing Emily Armstrong, MD. She is also board certed for surgery. Thanks the eye gods my eyeball pressure was normal, still have peripheral acuity and my 20/15 vision with glasses. She told me I am just ugly and she couldn’t do anything for that, except give gals Stevie Wonder glasses… I can tell ya she is blond, slim and a major cutie! All the right qualifications I need for a eye doc.
Prayers for healing.
Thank you blue!
A few years ago, I had a funny black area in my vision that I only noticed when my eyes were closed and I was facing a bright light – sort of like a round black blob at the bottom of my eye. Turned out to be a detaching retina. So I had a victrectomy. I let the anesthesiologist convince me that having it under local (only freezing the eyeball) was better than a general. Absolutely no fun, and I have since heard of 2 other people needing the same procedure, and I encouraged them in the strongest possible terms to go with the general anesthesia. All followed by 2 weeks of face down recuperation – no walking, no reading, no tv, no computer, no nothin’ And then I developed a cataract in that eye, so then had that procedure done. But the upside is, I now have perfect vision in that eye, and it’s been 5 years or more. Asked the doc if there was anything I did to cause it, and he said it was just the luck of the draw.
You were lucky! When I was a charge nurse we had a couple of victrectomy case that had to stay for a few days in a complete face down support system, as they had some complications and weren’t viable for a home stay. I remember how patients thought it was torture and awfully uncomfortable.
Hope it clears up without any problem. Gettin’ old sucks. —ken
Oh man, crazy…age does that. I didn’t get the blob, I started getting lightning shows in my right eye. Got checked out right away. Same gig, vitreous humor. Mostly abated after a month or so, but I still get one now and then. Usually occurs just on dark when I’m outside or going into a dark room in the house.
I asked the Doc about it occurring in my left eye…no time line, just when it does get in right away.
The doc asked if I was getting flashing of light, no I haven’t yet or seeing red, red is bad, meaning a bleed…
But that’s a cool look, when your eyes are scarlet with blood inside. The blacks shy away, thinking that you’re a debil-debil man.
Praying for you Cederq. Although we may all see a large flash of light soon but then it won’t matter.
That’s enough to scare the piss out of anyone.
Hopefully Doc is right.
Cederq, you can take my turn with ophthalmologists. Last week I had my 15th visit down to Brisbane for my last review after my right eye got fucked up on the op table in August ‘21, 1000km journey there are back.
The specialist said that he was really happy with the reattached of the macular and retina. So I asked how soon I can expect decent vision with it? Oh no, says he, too much damage to the macular and optic nerve after they neglected to secure my head against movement during surgery. So the op was a success, ut the patient died. Old joke.
Few things would scare me as much as problems with my eyes. Best of luck on the recheck!
Sounds to me like a flashback from a Allman Brothers concert and a handful of shrooms. This place already has its own Mr. Magoo, so you’re going to need to get yourself another form of ailment. You have some experience in that field so put your thinking cap on and let us know what you decide on.
In the meantime, hopefully this passes quickly and leaves you with no permanent loss of sight or additional mental damage.
The mental damage is already present. I really don’t want to be Johno’s doppelganger…
But at least then you’ll be attractive to women.
Yeah…..you don’t screw around with visual changes. Your only issued two eyeballs…no replacements. And if something goes wrong the clock ticks away real fast.
I saw a blue streak one day. Like I stared at a welding arc. But I hadn’t. Posterior Vitreous Detachment. It just pulled on the retina as it shrinks. But the eye doc sent me to the surgeon and I had both sides tack welded to avoid any tears. If you ever had nearsightedness, your retina is prolly weak in spots. Goes hand in hand.
Yeah, yearly checkups to make sure. Got a floater named Blob that I have to live with, but it sure beats blindness.
Glad you got it looked at asap.
Yes, I am very near sighted, have been since I was 7 or 8, have been wearing glasses since then and I am 64. I also have diabetic retinopathy, had extensive laser ablations in 2004, 2005 in both eyes. That was why I was very concerned about retinal detachment.
Then you know the drill. Well done. I learned about cobblestones and lattice. Weird how one issue points to another. praying for you brother.
I was once joking with a cop over wheather he was going to write me a ticket. When he allowed that he was letting me off I said that was a good thing cause I had been set to deliver my meanest curse if he wrote me up. He says, oh really what’s that?
May you live long enough to experience All of the various joys of the aging process.
Welcome to it, I found 55-60 to be the worst.
Take care, Cederq.
WTF,
I had almost the same thing happen from Friday to today. Dark blob in peripheral vision of left eye. By evening it had a hanging reverse J that swung like a pendulum when I looked left to right and back. Over Saturday and Sunday had an increasing appearance of spider webs in my eye. On Monday went to emergency and they pushed my buttons about retinal detachment. Got a referral for today with an eye specialist.
Turns out it was vitreous detachment not the retina. The blood thinner I’ve been on since first of December exacerbated bleeding from the area where the vitreous pulled free. The blood is what I was seeing and was what the doc on Monday thought was a retinal detachment.
I’m off the blood thinner after consults with three different docs today until a followup in Feb.
Of all the weird health problems and injuries I’ve suffered over the years this one scared me the worst until I knew what was happening.
After consideration and review I think this problem must have something to do with reading Bustednuckles.
wes
wtdb
Yes, wes, aggressive blood thinners may be required to treat vascular and cardiac issues, but be responsible for bleeding inside your eyes, especially with diabetic patients.
You can get blood plasma leakage over your macular, resulting in loss of visual acuity. Side effects like these are too common.
Dammit Wes, I’m on blood thinners. Guess I may have to stop and depart from this demented madness here at the old blog.
I really do hope this gets better for you. eyes are one of the few things I would not like to live without. got some grit/sand or whatever in one eye years ago.
it drove me nuts and ended up costing me a fair bit of cash to get fixed and a eye patch for a week. almost as bad. used a week vacation time as getting around was a problem.
it has always been safety glasses after that fuck up.
Good to know this was on the lower level of the concern scale.
Just had the same thing happen to me recently. Doctor told me the same thing…..it happened because I’m old. The nerve of her to call me old.
Funny thing they never tell you in orientation class about getting old and what maladies you gonna have to endure.
Cederq, among other eye problems, I’ve always had acute astigmatism. But I stopped worrying about it when pretty nurses told me that I was just a cute!
Best of luck CederQ.
I had a mini stroke in March 2017 caused by being in AFIB for more than day. I was driving home from a wake for a friend’s mother when a shadow appeared in the upper left quadrant of my visual field and a slight headache. As the night wore on the headache got wwaayy worse.
This was on a Saturday. Called the VA the next morning and asked to speak to the triage nurse. She set me up with an appointment for the eye clinic Wednesday the following week.
One would think that a triage nurse should recognize stroke symptoms when a patient describes sudden vision changes.
When the eye clinic manager, an ophthalmologist, read the report for the appointment on Monday, he immediately called me on the phone.
After reviewing the symptoms during the call, he told me he suspected I’d had a stroke. He set me up with a radioactive dye brain scan for the following day. Results of the scan were positive for a stroke.
I have two dead spots in the back of my brain, one about the size of my first thumb joint in lower right rear where vision is interpreted, the other about 3/4 that size on the lower left rear.
The headaches took about a month to dissipate and I had some problems with short term memory which have since dissipated. The neurologist told me those problems were due to brain swelling as a result of the damage from the stroke. That lasted about a month or so. The memory problems manifested mostly as not remembering where I’d parked my vehicle at the grocery store. I worked around that by parking near a landmark, a specific tree on the parking lot perimeter. I still park there.
They also had me scheduled with a Neurologist who did some testing and reviewed the scans. During the first visit, I asked him if my brain would rewire itself to bring back the missing portions in my vision which was readily apparent to me at the time. He said that was not possible with the evident damage.
Visual field tests subsequent to the stroke reveal that there is some loss and it has remained stable. However, over time my brain is ignoring those lost pieces of visual field. I just don’t “see” them anymore as I did after the stroke first occurred. It takes the visual field machine at the eye clinic to detect them now.
So, as others have said, if you experience a sudden change in your vision, call your doctor or get to your local hospital, tout suite.
From what I’ve read since, blood thinners can be successful in dissolving the clot if administered in a timely manner, if you’re having a stroke.
I have has floaters for years, I find this product Zeaxanthin works wonders to keep floaters at bay. You can get this product at Vit, Shoppe and other like stores.
Zeaxanthin is made for the eyes.
Z, I am looking into that!
Glad to hear you’re doing OK, C.
I was going to recommend an Opthalmic Surgeon in Medford, the guy who did my laser iridotomy, but I just got the letter from him about retiring from practice. Oh well. And if the doc you saw was in Roseburg, she’s likely the one my dad saw for quite a few years. I still laugh about the time he got a letter from DMV revoking his driver’s license. He was livid: “WHO TURNED ME IN?” Well, I’m sure it was his eye docs (he had more than one) as they were liable if they let him drive.
I do hope that your issues remain relatively benign. Keep that followup, even if it seems to resolve. There’s so much more to an eye exam than glasses. I went in for new glasses, and ended up with the iridotomy and an ongoing script for nightly eyedrops to prevent glaucoma. I count my lucky stars that it’s the only prescription med I am on.
Like Igor, and a few others here, I turn the big seven-oh in April, so I’ll qualify for true “geezer” status, as a recent comment from Nemo had it.
Greg, I am seeing Emily Armstrong, MD. She is also board certed for surgery. Thanks the eye gods my eyeball pressure was normal, still have peripheral acuity and my 20/15 vision with glasses. She told me I am just ugly and she couldn’t do anything for that, except give gals Stevie Wonder glasses… I can tell ya she is blond, slim and a major cutie! All the right qualifications I need for a eye doc.
Prayers for healing.
Thank you blue!
A few years ago, I had a funny black area in my vision that I only noticed when my eyes were closed and I was facing a bright light – sort of like a round black blob at the bottom of my eye. Turned out to be a detaching retina. So I had a victrectomy. I let the anesthesiologist convince me that having it under local (only freezing the eyeball) was better than a general. Absolutely no fun, and I have since heard of 2 other people needing the same procedure, and I encouraged them in the strongest possible terms to go with the general anesthesia. All followed by 2 weeks of face down recuperation – no walking, no reading, no tv, no computer, no nothin’ And then I developed a cataract in that eye, so then had that procedure done. But the upside is, I now have perfect vision in that eye, and it’s been 5 years or more. Asked the doc if there was anything I did to cause it, and he said it was just the luck of the draw.
You were lucky! When I was a charge nurse we had a couple of victrectomy case that had to stay for a few days in a complete face down support system, as they had some complications and weren’t viable for a home stay. I remember how patients thought it was torture and awfully uncomfortable.