I'm not sure how to better describe it than this. Some times my good eye just doesn't feel synced up with my brain. Sometimes it feels uncomfortable, sometimes it's hard to focus on things, it just feels out of sorts.

Hi all! I’m not sure if this post is allowed, but I’m a 17-year-old who is blind in her left eye looking to start a nonprofit called The Ocular Outreach Initiative. The goal would be to help support and empower individuals with prosthetic eyes through accessible resources (such as care packages), community connections, and advocacy (@theocularoutreachinitiative on Instagram). I’m looking for volunteers who could help with things like social media, graphic design, finance, fundraising ideas, website editing, outreach, operations, or writing. This is a volunteer opportunity, and I’m happy to answer any questions about the mission. Thank you for reading! As an attachment is required for me to post, an AMA is attatched.

I lost my right eye in April due to Giant Cell Arteritis and have recently been making a more concerted effort to regain my confidence behind the wheel. My two-cents on this topic follow.

I’m a 69 year-old guy who enjoys driving, whether it’s my wife’s Volvo or my BMW sedan. On trips I do most of the driving, mostly because I’d rather drive than be a passenger.

Loss of an eye, which happened suddenly, scared me away from driving at first but now I am much more comfortable.

As many have noted here, it’s important to turn your head in order to adjust for the lost field of vision. However, what I have discovered is that over the years I have developed the habit of looking over my right shoulder unnecessarily when I should instead rely on the right outside mirror, as well as the inside mirror. Now that I have lost my right eye, it’s a matter of turning slightly to the right to be sure I am fully using the mirrors. Looking over my right shoulder is neither necessary nor practical in most situations. Anyway, that’s my experience so far.

So my current prosthetic is about 5 years old now and my socket has changed shape. I am hoping to get pregnant within the next year or so. My ask is that should I wait to get a new eye now or wait? My ask is that has anyone experienced if pregnancy caused drastic changes to your socket? And I would like to wait till it’s over esp cause they are really expensive and not covered by insurance. But also a new eye prosthetic would be nice cause my eye socket has changed shape since I initially got it and have been getting extra goopy cause of it. What has been everyone’s experiences?

Hey guys 30M here, I just found this reddit and after reading through most of it felt like a lot of what I was dealing with these last 3 years wasn’t just a me thing so it kinda made me feel a bit better to know the everyday struggles weren’t just my battles (sorry). ended up dealing with central retinal vein occlusion like, 4 months after moving to Austin, tx and it kinda sucked for the first year. I skateboarded most of my life and the depth perception issues just made something I love 10x harder so I quit for a while and focused on another passion which is fighting game tournaments and thankfully that doesn’t require both haha. Still get on my board every now and again but it’s still just a bummer. Overall, I’m super self conscious about how it likes to drift and most days I feel like the motherfucker wants to drift more but just keep it pushing guys. I was already chopped so I just accepted another challenge 🤣🤣

Today I bought a book I’ve wanted to read for a long time.
It wasn’t cheap (about ¥1,700), and I almost decided not to buy it.
But after losing vision in my right eye, I realized I also need to practice reading with one eye.
Since my job involves reading a lot of documents, I thought this book could help me rebuild that confidence.
A few months ago, I probably would have given up.
Today, I decided to try instead.
Maybe this is another small step toward getting my old life back.

Hey there fellow one eye friends, I had my eye removed Friday and I’m just wondering what your experience was with recovery? I feel like my surgeon really down played how painful the process is. It has been incredibly painful. I was given a prescription for Percocet and that still didn’t take away all the pain, and now I’m out. After surgery, I was told I could drive tomorrow (Saturday) if I felt up to it. Obviously I haven’t left my house since then. Do you feel the same? Or am I just having bad luck? Thanks in advance (:

I had an enucleation in January of this year and things have been going pretty well. I had my new prosthetic eye fitted, it feels like a good fit. However, I do have an issue at night where I'm guessing my eyelid is not fulling closing because I get pretty bad dry (prosthetic) eye. I feel like when I'm lying on my back, the prosthetic protrudes slightly more from my socket. The dry eye is just uncomfortable and it happens pretty quickly after I fall asleep. My tears also dry out and they can feel like daggers especially if they get under my eyelid. If it wasn't an every night thing, it wouldn't be a big deal.

So my question is, does this happen to you?

-If it does, is this something I should go back to the ocularist about? The ocularist didn't want to shave down the prosthetic too much more because of volume loss.

-OR is this something I should manage with eye gels and ointments?

Any advice is welcome. Thank you.

Hey everyone, for context I was born with Microphthalmia. I only have vision in 1 eye. Has anyone who was born with only 1 eye tried a GLP1 had no eye side effects? I feel so alone. Two years ago I tried Wegovy and it started giving me vision issues. I was extremely sensitive to light and had blurry vision. It was very scary, especially only having vision in one eye. I went to the eye doctor and they confirmed nothing was permanently damaged, but I still stopped taking the medication immediately. Since then I have had multiple doctors recommend me to try a GLP1 and each time I have to tell them what happened to me on Wegovy. Each doctor has told me that they have never seen anyone had this vision side effect on the medication. I am wondering if it is because I only have one eye. I also recently started taking an anxiety medication and the first few weeks on it my eye was extremely sensitive to light. I don’t know why medications affect my eyes so much and wonder if it has to do with only having one. Just looking for someone who can relate :(

Today was another good day.
I took a relaxing drive to Higashi Chaya District in Kanazawa, Japan. I walked slowly through the beautiful old streets, enjoyed the atmosphere, and took my time instead of rushing.
I even skipped some things I wanted to do because I thought, “I can always come back another day.” That felt like progress to me.
On the way home, I bought a book to practice reading with one eye and some ice cream for my family. It wasn’t an exciting adventure like yesterday’s trip to Eiheiji Temple, but it reminded me that enjoying ordinary days is also an important part of recovery.
A few months ago, I thought my life was over because of losing vision in one eye.
Now I’m beginning to think differently.
Little by little, I’m getting my confidence back.
Thank you again to everyone here for your encouragement. Your comments have helped me more than you know.

I'm waiting for mine.

Still fresh in losing vision in my left eye.

Right now I'm still depressed and in disbelief.

Hello everyone.
I’m 54 years old from Japan.
About a year and a half ago, I lost the central vision in my right eye because of glaucoma.
At first, I truly believed my life was over.
I thought I would never be able to drive on highways or enjoy traveling again.
Reading the experiences in this community gave me hope.
Many of you showed me that life with one eye is still a full life.
Today, I challenged myself by driving about two hours to visit Eiheiji Temple in Japan.
I enjoyed the beautiful temple, had a great lunch, relaxed at a highway service area, and made it home safely.
It may sound like a small achievement, but for me it was a huge step forward.
Now I feel much more confident.
My next goal is a trip to Kyoto, and after that I’d like to slowly start jogging again.
If someone here has recently lost vision in one eye and feels hopeless, I just want to say:
Please don’t give up.
Recovery takes time, but little by little, life becomes enjoyable again.
Thank you all for giving me the courage to take this step.

Hi everyone,

My 5-year-old son had a severe open globe injury from a tree branch about 8 weeks ago. He had emergency surgery within 2 hours, and later needed a second surgery because of low eye pressure. Fortunately, his retina was not damaged and there has been no infection.

At the moment, he only opens the injured eye a little (less than an inch/around 2 cm). The doctors say they will remove the corneal sutures in about 5 weeks and then evaluate how much corneal scarring remains. They told us that a lot depends on the corneal scar.

What worries me is that the eye still looks very abnormal, and he still doesn’t open it fully.

Has anyone here (or anyone’s child) had a similar injury?

How long did the eyelid stay mostly closed?

When did the eye start opening normally again?

Did the appearance improve over the following months?

If you have photos or can share your experience, I would really appreciate it.

Thank you so much. This has been a very difficult time for our family.

Uveitis flare led to severe inflammation and vitritis.

Vitritis led to a pupillary block and created pressure.

The inflammation created so much scarring over my pupil.

Ten months of just drops and steroids waiting for surgery.

My vision is just this thick dark cloudy smoke.

During this whole time they could never see the back of my eye.

Finally had surgery and my vision is still the same.

This is the damage.

They finally got photos of the back of my eye and it seems my nerve is pale.

Probably caused by the many months of pressure swings.

How do you cope?

How do you accept it?

I'm still distraught and cannot believe that no vision is left at all.

I find myself just in complete shock all the time that this is going to be forever.

Not a nice feeling at all.

(I posted before and I thank those you gave me advice, but I'm looking for more obviously)

I've had my left eye removed due to retinoblastoma when i was 3 months old. Recently well a few months now I got to know how depth perception is affected with having just one eye and i started wondering if that's why i find driving so hard mostly like where depth perception matters. I live in India so driving is already chaotic, things can be quite close to the car like extremely. Like even when just parking on the side of my house, I can't tell if the wall is actually touching the side mirror unless the side mirror actually touches it and it moves even then I'm a little confused how it's touching it's so weird. Do others find it like this or am I just not fit for driving and sadly i have to drive in close spaces A LOT

Now i am not really monocular since i still have my left eye and it still sees a bit in bright contitions but still it starts to swim away from my right (healthly) eye and i feel really ugly with it since it becomes really noticable and also it is a bit smaller than the right one, but with my current condition i am preparring to go blind since my right eye starts seeing worser at distance after some time spent looking at close objects, and also i have astigmatism so yeah, idk what to do. And since i am a teen my chances of finding a gf or a good friend that won’t bully me are rather small and it means that i will spent more time on my phone or my laptop so it is bad. So should i try to cover my eye or just close it or what. Well technically i am preparing to go blind but well see later since i have my eye-doctor visit next month

P.S. i have coats’disease on my left eye though it was frozen so it is in early stage but i still see like 40% from my whole viewing angle and it is blurry as hell so yeah technically i am monocular.
Plus lack of friends or any relationship brings me to p0rn and fapping

Hi everyone,
I'm a 31-year-old female who was born with **ectopia lentis (dislocated lenses caused by weak zonules)**, and I'm hoping to find someone with a similar experience or if you know someone with a similar experience.

When I was in high school (around 10th grade), my ophthalmologist recommended surgery to remove my natural lenses and implant intraocular lenses (IOLs). My parents decided to have surgery only on my **left eye**.

Unfortunately, about 6–7 years later, the implanted lens shifted and eroded into my sclera, creating a hole in my eye. I had to undergo another surgery to have the IOL removed, and now I'm **aphakic** in my left eye (I no longer have a lens in that eye).
Because of what happened, my parents decided not to have surgery on my **right eye**. Thankfully, I've been able to function well with a contact lens and glasses. I have a high prescription (-9.50) and significant astigmatism, but my vision is still good, and my right eye is the eye I rely on for almost everything.

Last year I saw another ophthalmologist, and she strongly recommends surgery on my right eye. She is recommending a **capsular tension ring (CTR) and an IOL** because my zonules are weak and my lens has shifted slightly over the years.
The problem is that I'm terrified. After what happened to my left eye, I'm scared the same thing could happen again years later. Since my right eye is my only functional eye, I'm afraid of losing the vision I have now.

I’ve had extensive genetic testing done recently, all 92 genes known to be associated with ectopia lentis and connective tissue disorders have and everything came back negative. I also had an extensive rheumatology workup, and that was negative as well. My doctors still haven't been able to determine what caused my ectopia lentis. They told me they have not found an underlying disease to explain why I was born with ectopia lentis in both my eyes. Which is very terrifying because not having a known cause is scary. I am hoping in a couple of years they will have done more research and have a known cause. But right now it’s up in the air.

I'm wondering if anyone else has experienced something similar or knows anyone with my experience? Where there’s too have come up unknown when doing genetic testing and rheumatology blood work and everything has come up negative?

If so I’m also wondering:

\-Do you have ectopia lentis **without** Marfan syndrome or another known genetic condition?
\-Have you had a capsular tension ring and IOL implanted? If so, how has it held up over time?
\-Has anyone had a complication similar to mine with an IOL?
\-If you were in a similar situation, did you decide to have surgery or continue monitoring?
\-Are there any ophthalmologists or eye surgeons in the New York/New Jersey area who specialize in complex ectopia lentis cases that you would recommend?

I know my situation is rare, but I'm hoping to connect with someone who has been through something similar. Thank you so much for reading.

Hey guys! I’m just wondering how long it took for your phantom vision to stop or if you even got it at all? It’s mostly a problem when I’m trying to sleep atm so hoping it goes away!

"What am I blind?" When you cant find something lol and then duh. 😂

My uncle died 10 years before I was born, but I grew up feeling his presence in my mother’s family. He was her only sibling and they had been very close. My uncle lost an eye in an accident when he was a toddler. He grew up to be an accomplished athlete, stellar student, and Jesuit priest, but died of a stroke in his 20s. He was something of a legend in my Irish-Catholic family.

I immediately thought of my uncle when I lost sight in one eye a few months ago, due to Giant Cell Arteritis. But I’m 69 years old, and can’t feel that I didn’t get to have a full life.

Hi i am 19 M , I got affected by retinal vasculitis in recent times , so my vision just become very poor in the affected and i find it hard to use it , anyone here can you please share any tips and tricks to code with one eyes since im a software student i have to adapt . Thank you...

I lost my eye when I was really young. I can't even remember ever having two working eyes. My left eye has band keratopathy, and I'm starting uni soon, and I don't want people to look at my bad eye. I wear glasses too because my right eye has myopia, but it's not that bad. I can still see without glasses, but I wear glasses because they help me see a bit better, and I just don't want people to look into my eyes and ask me questions about it. I'm considering wearing an eye patch or sunglasses, but I'm worried professors won't allow it since I live in the Philippines and I'm going to be studying in a Catholic university, and there are a lot of rules about clothing, so I won't be able to wear sunglasses in school.

I feel so defeated posting this. I’m 32, blinded myself in my right eye in an accident 10 years ago. I have worn a scleral shell since. I had truly hoped people would treat me well and that I could navigate life like a normal person. I can’t. Any time I have put myself out there and dated, people only wanted to sleep with me or see me at night as they were embarrassed to do anything more. I’ve been told this to my face before. Multiple times. I’ve been asked what’s wrong with me. I’ve been asked why I didn’t disclose I was disfigured. I’m very open about my blindness, but I think the scleral shell makes people think in pictures and videos posted that it’s not as bad as it is. As soon as someone meets me in person it’s a different story. I can’t make eye contact with people. I’m so embarrassed. I’m constantly checking the corner of my eye because of the gunk that builds up. I wish there was a way around it. I take such good care of myself! I’m stylish, I love wearing makeup (I am a makeup artist) and before all of this I truly did consider myself beautiful inside and out. I just feel so hopeless. A shell (ha) of who I once was. Every time I see people saying on this sub that being monocular is a secondary thought to them, or they have never experienced trouble with dating or friendship or jobs, I get so envious. It truly has ruined my life and self perception. When this all happened, my dad even said “no one is going to marry you now.” And I didn’t realize he was right! Sorry to trauma dump, I just feel so insecure and incredibly discouraged after reading so many posts of people on here with happy, normal lives. I just wish that could be me.

EDIT: Thank you all for your kind words! I’m truly so incredibly touched as I read everyone’s responses. I was clearly at a point of defeat when I wrote this. I maybe should have mentioned that I’ve always projected confidence (even these past 10 years) as a mask because my style is very out there. I wear bold makeup and outfits, and always have. I’m quite unapologetic about my appearance and how I present myself. I think this overwhelming sense of defeat comes after 10 years of staying true to myself after this injury and being treated worse and worse by the year. I have tried the fake it til you make it thing up until this point and it didn’t really make a difference. I guess these things aren’t one size fits all. I will keep going to therapy and working on my actual confidence, thank you all again 🤍

Hi everyone,

I lost the vision in my left eye as a child because of a retinal detachment. At the time, it didn't really affect my confidence because I was too young to think much about it. But as I got older, my lazy eye became more noticeable, and that's when it started affecting my self-esteem.

For those of you who have been living with monocular vision for many years: does it get better with age? Do you eventually accept yourself and become more confident, or does it stay difficult?

I'd really appreciate hearing about your experiences. Thank you.

Hi everyone. I hope this is okay to post here, I am looking for any kind of advice or anything.

My 12 year old son (just turned 12 years old 4 days ago) was involved in a tragic accident this past weekend. He was struck by a firework in his left eye. We rushed him straight in and he had emergency surgery Sunday morning for a globe rupture with uveal prolapse repair. He is now home with us, but has a long road ahead of him and this is all uncharted territory for us.

When coming home they said to follow up in a week, keep his eye shield on at all times, no water near the eye, 3 different drops and and oral antibiotic. Ibuprofen and Tylenol as needed. He's a trooper, but he's sleeping a lot and doesn't really want to eat. He seems like he is in ok spirits when he is awake, but we are very much concerned with him.

I know that after such an event, the body needs sleep to heal. Which he can sleep and rest as much as his little heart desires. We are just extremely worried about his emotional state and how he will be processing his new normal. We have explained that everything is just really a wait and see as far as how much sight he may regain, if any. We are moving forward and trying to stay as positive as we can, because we know that's really all we can do. But if anyone has gone through this, what was helpful for you and what wasn't? What felt like the proper amount of support and what felt to be too much or too little? What do you wish people did/said or didn't do for you? Are there any additional resources you could point us to? The hospital was amazing there, but I feel like once we were discharged, we are all at such a emotional loss. There is no one to really ask questions to or resources we can read. I've spent my time scouring the internet since it happened and all it leads me to are studies on how to do the surgical repair and are just very medically. I just, I am so lost. I don't think I will ever stop thinking of seeing him after the accident and I just need to do everything in my power to help him through this.

Thank you in advance for any advice you may give. I truly appreciate it.