u/GrappleLacquer

I went suddenly blind in about 15% of my field of vision in my left eye right before I turned 32. Went straight to the emergency room, no signs of a stroke, everything looked golden so they determined it must be neurological. Sent me to a neurologist.
She took one look at me and informed me that it was probably because I was overweight, and my spinal column was producing too much spinal fluid, which was then causing pressure on my brain and acting like a tumor. Got a spinal tap. Pressure was on the low end of normal.

Went back to her. Was told “I still think it’s related to you being significantly overweight. If you lose weight your vision will probably come back.”

At the time I was 5’7” tall and weighed 155 lbs. I was competing regularly in Brazilian jiu jitsu, rock climbing, and hiking almost every weekend.

Now, I will admit that I was carrying a little bit of extra fat pack here and there. However, I also am pretty dang sure that there’s a *LOT* of humans out there that are a lot fatter than me and almost all of them can still see?

(Fun? ending to the story: I had a DVT about a year later and they were like “oh shit you have a clotting disorder we missed, our bad! You definitely had a stroke that either cleared itself or was so small we missed it in the ER.” I’m on blood thinners now but I still get mad when I think about it)

EDITED TO ADD/ FAQs:
I’ve been to two retinal specialist, I’ve been to a general ophthalmologist, I’ve been to an Opthoneurologist, I went to three or four general neurologist, and then I’ve been to my cardiologist and my hematologist.

I have been fully checked! we know what caused it! I just didn’t write about all the other doctors initially because none of them were infuriating.

The vision is permanently gone unfortunately.

I am on a daily blood thinner, which means that I don’t get to compete in the sport I love anymore, but I am still able to do it with trusted partners, which is so much better than I thought it would be when I first heard that I would have to be on blood thinners for the rest of my life!

This all happened several years ago and I’ve been living a happy, healthy life for the last three years, (which is also part of the reason why it’s only mildly infuriating as this is in my past) I just was thinking about it today because one of my friends had a similar comment from a doctor.

Also, yes, I did have severe medical anxiety for several years after being mystery blind for a year and going to a different doctor couldn’t tell me why I was mystery blind constantly! My hematologist and one of the neurologist went a really really long way towards helping me get to a better place about it by being kind and very willing to keep me in the loop. I also spent a lot of money on therapy.

Due to the nature of the discussion: SPOILERS ABOUND, ABANDON THREAD ALL YE FIRST TIME READERS WHO HAVE NOT YET FINISHED.

So. I don’t mean like “I don’t like Chaol” or “I liked Chaol the whole way through!”

I wanna hear ones you’re afraid might get you kicked out of the subreddit.

I’ll go first: I don’t really get the Nehemia love? Yes, she is a great princess, incredibly devoted to her people and she is important to the story, but she’s not a good friend. She’s incredibly manipulative the entire time she’s in the story. Even her death is manipulative! She’s not honest with Aelin about so many things. I think I never really loved her because I never trusted her. Her death didn’t affect me much and I don’t understand why she is a fan favorite. Dorian is a truer friend to Aelin than she is.

My husband’s is that both Aelin and Chaol are equally stupid in Queen of Shadows. He went on a rant the other day. (We’re reading them together. It’s my third read though, his first)
Points for Chaol being dumb:
• He thinks Aelin shouldn’t have magic because she may attack his people, despite seeing her refuse to kill innocent people the king sent her to kill
• he’s chill with Dorian’s magic but not Aelin
• He’s astonished the assassin assassinates people occasionally
• He’s the captain of the guards for the most ruthless monarch on the continent but is so squeamish of death. Like even if he hasn’t had to kill, he logically should have been mentally prepared to (like if the king is attacked at a function?) and it makes no sense he hadn’t
• He blames Aelin for being “showy” killing general Narrok without even hearing her side

Points for Aelin being equally dumb:
• She blames Chaol for Nehemia’s death even though: 1. Nehemia planned her death 2. She still would have left the castle to save Chaol that night. There’s no way she doesn’t.
• She blames Chaol for Dorian being collared, even though there was no way he could have stopped it.
• She doesn’t give him credit for immediately joining the resistance and doing his all to save civilians
• It took her way too long to realize Lysandra probably didn’t love being a courtesan and also had horrid things done to her

My bonus unpopular opinion is that the original book covers are SO ugly and the newer ones are way better.

Okay, let me hear it! Are we insane? Do you have a more insane opinion?

I finally ran into a dude that was super aggressive about judging women’s reading habits! Our friends introduced us at a hangout and where like “you both read more than anyone else we know!”

He asks me how many books I’ve read this year. I tell him I’m right around 40.

Man goes on a SCREED about how women just read smut and call it reading and don’t read things that challenge them. Then is like “what are you reading right now?”

I got to hit him with “well I’m usually reading three books at any given time since I like to have a book that fits my mood. At the current moment I’m reading a non-fiction discussion of man’s attempts to control and engineer the Mississippi River, and the consequences of that. Then I’m re-reading War and Peace cause I just love Tolstoy. Oh and then, yes I’m reading a smutty dramione fan fic. Congrats, you got me. Women who read smut aren’t really readers, obviously…What are you reading?”

He’s reading Clive Cussler (which is fine! They are entertaining! But maybe not “coming in on the highest horse in town” material) and he didn’t really wanna chat anymore.

(For the record/m: I absolutely think people should read what they enjoy and reading 100 books of just smut all year is fine. I’m just a bit of an eclectic reader and it worked out perfectly in this instance)