I live in a place with the highst rate of myopia in the world. Myo-what? That's the medical term for short-sightedness. Most of my friends will agree with me that it is very annoying to have a pair of spectacles perching on your nose, without which you'd have to grope carefully in order not to trip over things while walking. Being myopic is more of a psychological scar than an everyday inconvenience for me. The reason I say this is because of the circumstance that made me short-sighted.
I was born to parents who did not need to wear glasses. My mum is not myopic now although she is beginning to develop long-sightedness due to old age. This condition results in her not being able to see things clearly at a close range. Think of it as the opposite of myopia. But I am digressing.
Photo credit: www.freephoto1.com
After a tempestuous relationship, my parents separated when I was barely learning how to control my piss. Anyway, I was put under the care of my maternal grandmother. Now, as it turns out, my mum was an adopted child so there isn't any blood relation between her and granny. This is an important point, as we shall see later. The other significant thing to note is that my granny's biological sons are all severely myopic.
Effectively, I was put into an environment where short-sightedness was the norm. I was also made to read textbooks over long hours under a dim fluorescent light bulb. The first sign of failing eye-sight appeared when I turned 10 years of age. I found that I couldn't read the service numbers of public buses until they came right up to the bus stop. I remember a funny experience with a friend of mine who also had problems with his eyesight. We had missed a bus because we couldn't read the number until it was too late to flag. Yes, bus drivers were and still are an impatient lot. So we devised a plan. You know how it is with 10-year-old boys, they come up with the most ingenious of plots. My friend stationed himself about 50 metres ahead of the bus stop and he did the number spotting, waving to me when the right bus approached. I then had ample time to flag the bus while he would make a mad dash back to the bus stop.
So that was my first step into the world of myopia. I was definitely coerced into it. I remember the physical abuse that I received if I did not do well in school. One of my uncle even set his own test papers for me on a weekly basis, giving me a good thrashing when I got any mistake. Once he returned from work while I was watching TV. He promptly interrogated me on why I was not studying. I got another beating with the warning to "make sure that you are studying when I return home." All that abuse was witnessed by other members of the household. No one intervened.
There is only so much that a yound child can take before he breaks and does one of two things: run away or allow his will to be broken. For good or bad, I chose to conform to expectations, putting in countless hours of revision and reading. All the while under unsuitable lighting conditions.
My short-sightedness hangs like a ghost from the past, a reminder of the unhappy days and how I was robbed of my birthright. I have no genetic pre-disposition towards myopia but I was forced to abuse my eyes to point of failure.
Now that I'm a father of two beautiful daughters, I pray desperately everyday that they will not have to wear glasses when they start going to school. Because when I put on my glasses every morning, I am reminded of the emotional baggage that flawed care-givers placed on me so many years ago.
I was born to parents who did not need to wear glasses. My mum is not myopic now although she is beginning to develop long-sightedness due to old age. This condition results in her not being able to see things clearly at a close range. Think of it as the opposite of myopia. But I am digressing.
Photo credit: www.freephoto1.com
After a tempestuous relationship, my parents separated when I was barely learning how to control my piss. Anyway, I was put under the care of my maternal grandmother. Now, as it turns out, my mum was an adopted child so there isn't any blood relation between her and granny. This is an important point, as we shall see later. The other significant thing to note is that my granny's biological sons are all severely myopic.
Effectively, I was put into an environment where short-sightedness was the norm. I was also made to read textbooks over long hours under a dim fluorescent light bulb. The first sign of failing eye-sight appeared when I turned 10 years of age. I found that I couldn't read the service numbers of public buses until they came right up to the bus stop. I remember a funny experience with a friend of mine who also had problems with his eyesight. We had missed a bus because we couldn't read the number until it was too late to flag. Yes, bus drivers were and still are an impatient lot. So we devised a plan. You know how it is with 10-year-old boys, they come up with the most ingenious of plots. My friend stationed himself about 50 metres ahead of the bus stop and he did the number spotting, waving to me when the right bus approached. I then had ample time to flag the bus while he would make a mad dash back to the bus stop.
So that was my first step into the world of myopia. I was definitely coerced into it. I remember the physical abuse that I received if I did not do well in school. One of my uncle even set his own test papers for me on a weekly basis, giving me a good thrashing when I got any mistake. Once he returned from work while I was watching TV. He promptly interrogated me on why I was not studying. I got another beating with the warning to "make sure that you are studying when I return home." All that abuse was witnessed by other members of the household. No one intervened.
There is only so much that a yound child can take before he breaks and does one of two things: run away or allow his will to be broken. For good or bad, I chose to conform to expectations, putting in countless hours of revision and reading. All the while under unsuitable lighting conditions.
My short-sightedness hangs like a ghost from the past, a reminder of the unhappy days and how I was robbed of my birthright. I have no genetic pre-disposition towards myopia but I was forced to abuse my eyes to point of failure.
Now that I'm a father of two beautiful daughters, I pray desperately everyday that they will not have to wear glasses when they start going to school. Because when I put on my glasses every morning, I am reminded of the emotional baggage that flawed care-givers placed on me so many years ago.
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Technorati: myopia, health, lasik
2 comments:
For goodness sake, emmetropia is NOT a birthright. I just had to laugh. Fine, blame your carers for making you study hard. Maybe it would have been better if they let you be a delinquent -coz you'd be happier with perfect vision despite being penniless and jobless? My goodness. And an additional point: your carers were just doing their best for you within the limitation of what they knew, same as the way you are with your kids now. You just knew different things coz it's different times. You know what's scary? Your kids will judge you the same way you judged your carers. Relax a little, have more compassion and grow up ;)
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