Helena's Blog

A New Life

helenacampbell — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 22:18:53 +0000

I read to 14/20, almost 14/15 today outside and it was somewhat cloudy.

I go running sometimes. If I am feeling good enough, and especially if I have a beloved friend along, my vision can clear a lot as I run. I don’t experience the same feeling when I go by myself, and I feel disappointed. I feel like I should be able to just get so sweaty, and tired, that my brain can only think of moving my body forward, looking where I’m going, thinking about the steps. In this sort of pseudo-meditation, I should be able to relax. I don’t know if I’m not running hard enough or far enough, but I don’t experience that.

Today, I didn’t run very much, due to my being a little disappointed and confused in how well I didn’t feel. I had an expectation of my vision clearing, I think, but I didn’t experience it. That confusion led to me just stopping. Yet I did better on the chart than I usually do, even on a sunny day (I generally nowadays can get to 15/30–about half).

I will continue my practice. Some days I’m happier than others. If I can put into words, or at least figure out the secret, removing all the outside factors, I know that I will be much happier. The happiness is inside me, but right now I need other people, totems even, to help me experience it.

Contacts

helenacampbell — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 15:12:59 +0000

So I decided to try some reduced contacts. I know that there’s trouble in that you can’t remove them continually, but they have some benefits in that they’re lightweight and at least they don’t limit your peripheral vision with a frame edge.
However, I feel like the curvature of my eye is fluctuating a lot and the contacts don’t continue to fit. They fit well for two days, but at some point I was getting air bubble under them and they would not stay.
Nobody believes that the curvature of my eye can change so quickly. I can feel it though, over the course of a few weeks. Sometimes they’re hard and bulging (generally when I get too stressed). I get some rest, take a shower, and do the eye chart, they shrink and they feel softer (at least to my perception). I shrank my left eye dramatically at one point (see post, the incredible shrinking eye) by using an eye bag. I had a sinus problem at the time so the heat made that feel better, but afterwards my left eye was sore (in a nice way) and much softer.
My eyes also feel harder after wearing the contacts and they feel a bit dry.
Any insight into this? I’m curious.

Breakfast

helenacampbell — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 15:37:11 +0000

I just had cereal for breakfast. My milk in the fridge went bad, so I had to go and buy one of the small containers (they’re like a pint?). I wish I could keep more food in my room, but my fridge is very small, and doesn’t keep food well. Plus cereal is terrible, and terrible for you, so I don’t enjoy eating it. I feel a little sick right now. I thought I was doing well to keep cereal in my room, and a bit of milk. I eat Crisp Rice (off-brand of Rice Krispies), because the only ingredients are really rice and sugar (plus some vitamin additives). It’s good that I try to keep food in my room, so that I can eat breakfast. A lot of days I end up not doing it though (why my milk went bad, partially), because the thought of cereal disgusts me so much.
The only really good cereals to eat are completely plain. Usually this means steel-cut oatmeal, but I guess you could eat things like barley or something. I do have some steel-cut oatmeal (not in my room, at my friend’s–he has his own kitchen and an excellent fridge). I soak it overnight in water and whey (actually kefiran), and then cook it in the morning with milk and water. I add lots of honey and apple sauce and milk afterwards. It’s much tastier, and much healthier than cold cereal. Oatmeal on its own isn’t so tasty, but I add delicious things like apple sauce to it. (I know, it’s rather sugary, but at least a human body can process it properly). If I had some buttermilk or heavy cream, I might add that too. No such things in high-quality are in my area (and, I feel, for anyone who goes to the regular grocery store). I had to go to Trader Joe’s to get the really good steel-cut oatmeal.
Sometimes in my friend’s room, we eat eggs, and bacon.
I also end up eating a lot of candy and chocolate during the day because I don’t eat breakfast.
I like a lot of what I eat–I had lamb the other night, I often eat steak, grilled cheese (with real cheddar, and on sourdough of course!), toast with butter on the aforementioned sourdough bread, beet kvass, soaked oatmeal, eggs. In cooking, I use excellent sea salt (it really is better than regular salt, more tasteful).
I don’t eat many vegetables, I have some as a side with my meat sometimes. That consists of broccoli and corn. Corn isn’t great for you, but the broccoli is all right.
I haven’t been able to get good quality kefir lately, I will have to work at that to make that a little better, but I drink that too–it’s good.
That stuff isn’t perfect, of course, but it’s pretty good. Plus I got some raw cheddar cheese recently, I will be using that on my grilled cheese soon I hope. Unfortunately, none of this food lives at my house. I have to visit someone for it. I can’t keep any food of my own, which makes my eating a little tentative at times.
Here’s what I have: storage space for dry foods (anything that could go in a pantry), a bowl and spoon. I have a fridge, but it’s not very good. I shouldn’t eat unsoaked grains, which means, okay, I am willing but disappointed in having to keep fruit bars, or granola bars (and they’re rather expensive). I guess I could keep some plain yogurt, although it doesn’t keep well either (slightly better than milk, of course, because it’s already soured). Plus nobody eats plain yogurt, I might be able to keep it in the communal fridge.
If I get a can opener, I could keep some canned foods. What does that entail? I guess I’ll have to be willing to eat unsoaked beans as well (which is much easier to quit than unsoaked grains! Americans love their breads, but so rarely is it sourdough).
If I can keep bread, yogurt, and canned food like tuna, I think I’ll be able to have tuna sandwiches. Well, excellent. Hm, but I can’t eat a can of tuna in one sandwich, or even want to eat one in a day–it’ll go bad.
It’s very tricky to navigate this.
Another thought is perhaps some rice, rice is pretty good.
Dried beans, I can then soak them as I want, that would be much better. I think I could cook things in the communal kitchen. Mm, that sounds delicious–soaked rice and sprouted lentils.
I’ll have to think about these things some more, if anyone has any ideas for me (even if they include grain), let me know.
Thanks!

Raised Clavicle!

helenacampbell — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 07:19:27 +0000

I just noticed it now in the bathroom mirror–one of my clavicles is higher than the other!
I was in an accident a month ago, a car hit me while I was crossing the street (so very annoying). I suffered a hip contusion and I’d hit my shoulder on the ground also, so there was some sort of sprain thing going on there.
My shoulder has been hurting of late, but the car accident pain seemed to have gone away, I was fine for a while, and then this strange pain started up. I did some shoulder stretches, they helped some. I didn’t notice the clavicle trouble, and only then did I put two and two together–perhaps the pain in my shoulder is from my accident. Of course, this may not be the cause (consider arthritis from a poor diet, or just an extension of the stress in my neck).
Anyway, this post is not in line with my others, I am basically just asking for help here, what should I do?

Exhaustion and New Activity

helenacampbell — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 07:04:32 +0000

I have been really tired lately. I sleep a lot. I picked up this habit over break, where I decided to sleep as much as my body would let me, with no alarm. I went to sleep when I wanted (sometimes very late, sometimes earlier) and slept as much as possible.
The reason I decided to do this was I decided that if I was sleeping so much, my body probably needed it. My sleep isn’t as restful as it should be, I think, so why not grab a few extra hours? I think I slept something between 9 and 11 hours each night.
Now what I have been doing is, back at school, I wake up in the morning, and then get exhausted by class, go to sleep from 5-8 and then go to sleep for the night at about 2am, waking up at 9:30.
I’d like to not sleep as much, I wake up like a monster, plus I do have things to do.
Part of the trouble may be that my sleep isn’t restful, as it should be. I usually collapse in a heap of exhaustion at 5pm, but because I plan to go to sleep at about 2am, I palm before going to sleep. I usually do the chart just before going to bed, and in the morning.
However, I still wake up with an aching neck, and my eyes feel really dry and sore.
I try to drink water (though not a thirst-quencher, anything else to drink is simply too sugary). I have also been trying to eat.
I wake up early enough to have breakfast, but not a great breakfast. That is, I don’t have the resources and time needed to have a good breakfast–say bacon and eggs, or at least eggs. The best I can do is rice crispy cereal (off-brand actually slightly of higher quality than the other). That is the only kind of cereal I can eat because I can’t eat any other type of grain or flour, which other cereals have.
I’m trying to eat a bit more, hoping for the food to give me more energy. Of course my breakfast isn’t great, and lunch happens after classes (or not, depending on whether I just fall asleep). Dinner tonight was good–steak and some broccoli and corn.

I think I need new activities again. I haven’t been running due to my weird schedule of sleep, but I have been doing yoga, as I ‘ve been taking a class. I keep meaning to go swimming, but again, I’m always asleep or in class when the pool is open.
It’s sort of strange how I can’t just keep repeating the same activity and keep getting a similar result. One day, yoga and reading a book is just the combination I need of relaxing for my neck to pop, and then some days it seems not to work at all.
I went weightlifting, which is a good activity for me usually, but it just wasn’t working. I think the next thing to try is swimming.
As always, these new things last for a week, maybe a month, before I have to switch it up again. Of course, I will have to keep up with the yoga for the next 2-3 months while I am enrolled in the class.

Lastly, I did find some astigmatism. I had to look at much finer and more lines than before. It’s a good improvement.
My chart work is of late being done close, at about 2 to 3 feet. I am getting flashes, and can often read 2/10, and reasonably often read 2/7. Last time I went to the eye doctor my close vision was 20/80, so this is an improvement over that.

Time to sleep! I think…

Yoga and the Wheel

helenacampbell — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 06:21:25 +0000

My post titles have a theme now, maybe I will keep it up. Two things, seemingly unrelated, that I will focus on. X and Y.
Well, it amuses me, in any case.

Today I did some yoga. My method of doing yoga is generally to get a tape or DVD from the library and then do it once and return it. I’ve gotten several tapes so far. I also do some of the stretches that I have memorized on my own at some points.
I got a Shiva Rea “yoga trance dance” DVD. A lot of it was just freeform dance, which is a lot of fun–just letting go and being crazy.
It is kind of hard to follow a tape, though, especially since you bend down, put your head on the ground, and can’t see what Shiva is doing anymore. Nevertheless, the left side of my neck cleared admirably afterwards. I still have a stabbing pain in my left shoulder, and my neck’s right side didn’t pop nicely like the left side. I want to get better movement in both sides, and be able to turn my head more fully to the left.

Instead of the Snellen chart (mostly), I’ve been practicing on the Tibetan wheel. It’s fun, and it’s easier in the sense that I don’t forget and force my eyes down a line. I’ve been doing that because I was thinking of how I should get rid of the little astigmatism I had. But I think that’s improved considerably. I played a little bit with some dial charts, and with plain glasses (ie, that have only myopia correction) the lines were all equivalent. In fact, they seem pretty much the same even without glasses.
I think the trouble is rather sluggishness. Good vision is quick, clears new things up quickly. But I’m slow, shifting and clearing a different-angled line isn’t as quick as it should be. Anyway, I remember a certain picture with lines on it graying more as I moved it around–now it doesn’t. I don’t know when I did this last. It might be that my slight astigmatism is not noticeable by me.
But, I would tentatively like to announce that I have improved my astigmatism to the point that I can’t find it anymore–and without even noticing what I was doing!

PS: I did a Magic Eye for the first time in my life! Also, any tips on how I could work on color vision?

Astigmatism and the park

helenacampbell — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 04:22:35 +0000

I went to the park today, they have animals there–goats, pigs, emus, different raptors. I went with a friend I see only once a year, and haven’t talked to much lately in the past few months. I regaled him with story upon story of things I’ve been up to, and it felt really nice to talk and look at the animals. And it helped me. I never get to talk to anyone, face-to-face conversation like that, not nice like that. I often get teased or ignored. People think I am very shy because I never talk. It’s true, I am shy, but if I can get started properly, I can talk your ear off! He kept asking me if this was helping, if it was relaxing me. At first I said no, but then my neck popped on both sides, and I told him that he did a really good job, and this was a great outing that really made me happy. I felt really good.
I don’t know if not sharing is better than being teased. It’s odd how it seems more difficult now, when I have become less sensitive.
I guess the conclusion is to have friends that you don’t see very often but still feel comfortable enough with to invite out, that way you can have the gladness of sharing everything. It’s cathartic, even though these are stories that other people have heard, just because I got them all out at once.

Astigmatism! I practiced with a Tibetan wheel today. Like I said, my astigmatism is mild (I think, anyway), at least I feel comfortable in glasses without astigmatism correction. The wheel was fun, I took breaks to palm and did some stretches, and spent some time sitting and focusing on my breathing also. All of these things helped make the wheel blacker and clearer temporarily.
I had a strange pain behind my right eye. A result of using the eye in a new way?
I did the wheel at different distances, 8 feet, 3 feet, and 1 foot. I don’t know if what I’m doing will help with my astigmatism per se, but the act of sitting and relaxing and practicing central fixation, dodging, and closing the eyes to rest them are all positive things.
I’m not sure how the wheel is supposed to work, because the way it is, I can’t even tell from it at what axes I have trouble and how much.
I do stretch my eyes in a clock rotation (look at 9 o clock, 10 o clock, 11 o clock, and so on). I find looking to 2 o clock the most difficult. And I roll my eyes all the way around, it is hard to keep turning when I hit 7 o clock.

I haven’t been running in a few days, I need to remedy that.

Giant E and confusion

helenacampbell — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 18:20:03 +0000

TL;DR: thanks to my practice, my vision is the best amongst my sisters; thinking about practicing a dial chart for astigmatism, what do folks think on that?

I haven’t posted in over a month. It’s just not fun to post anymore. I do go on the internet, I have winter break now so I have been keeping up with my Snellen card practice–but posting is sort of a nuisance.
My father was really surprised when I told him about Zenni optical, he ordered some glasses for my sisters off of there. He was happy that they were so cheap.
Both of them needed to pay $9 extra because of the extra strength. One of my sisters has something like -8.25/-8.75, so that’s extra. My other sister has milder myopia than me (-4.00/-5.00?) but has -2.25 astigmatism in one eye (I can’t remember their prescriptions exactly).
I could be like them, but I’m the only one whose prescription is regular strength. My father is confused, “how can anybody get to -9? At -3 or -4 people say you’re blind!”, yet he says needing glasses isn’t a disease. By definition it is…you’re not at ease (relaxed, or even really happy).
I wish I could convince them, but I feel that even if I returned to perfect sight, they still wouldn’t listen to me.

I’m not in perfect health, of course, I suffer a lot from strain and stress that I have been easing into removing by practicing my Snellen chart, palming and running. I can get so dizzy sometimes and my neck is just a killer, plus I have been having trouble with tinnitus.
The only way I really know to remove this is to do my eye stuff, by relaxing I can remove the pain. Running, as exercise, is a stress reliever as well. I wish I had some more potent tools at my side. Well, not that the tools I have aren’t potent, I just don’t know how to use them well enough to make them potent. That’s what I have been learning to do.

I work on the Snellen chart indoors a lot nowadays. It’s not too cold, but sitting outside for a long time is a lot easier when it’s warm.
So I sit in my bedroom, I’m about 7-8 feet away. I can get about 7/30 if it’s daytime, it’s more like 7/50 at night using incandescent light bulbs. What I focus on doing, however, is to keep moving back up to the 200 line (giant E). I tell myself that the important thing is to make sure that I can see the E. Since the chart isn’t a monotonically increasing ability, I can’t always see 7/50, 7/30 or even 7/200. I have to move back up, remind myself of what I’m doing, close my eyes, to clear that E again. The reasons for this is I don’t want to strain myself by forcing onto lower lines (it’s a tool, remember?), and also if I can do this consistently I may be able to see the giant E clearly at the doctor’s office. That’s the 20/400 line, there. Last time I went I ended up on the finger test because I couldn’t clearly see the E. So that would be a giant step up for me.

Also I looked at a dial chart the other day. The lines seemed about equal except for the 90° line (straight vertical). My astigmatism is minor -0.50×170 for right eye -0.75×175 for left eye at last checkup. Of course the treatment is the same as for myopia–relax, do your chart, swing. There are also stereoscopic vision cards, which I’m afraid of. I’m thinking about eliminating the astigmatism because that would help my overall vision and is a little less scary than thinking of overcoming my whole myopia (gotta break it down into smaller goals).
I’m thinking about practicing a dial chart, or a dot chart. It’d be a break from the regular Snellen and interest my brain in a new way. If anyone knows more about this, please let me know!

Exercise

helenacampbell — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 15:50:53 +0000

Just wanted to give that link out, it’s a nice article.

I am displeased with myself because I seem to have hit a plateau, possibly getting worse even due to bad practice. Thanksgiving break is coming up, so I want to use it to rest. I am exercising, though, and doing my chart inside. I think I get something like 3/20 or so. I feel like I need to completely change it up, because it’s not going so well.
Best is to go outside, sunshine makes it rather easy, but it’s pretty cold for that.
Also am finding that palming is difficult on my shoulders.
Lots of old problems resurfacing it seems, things I thought I’d gotten over when I was just starting out. It’s been almost a year now, and I have had measured improvement, but I just wish I could relax more.
I think it’s school, makes it so hard because I’m always work, work, working, never time to rest. I did a good job this summer and the previous winter break. I wish that I could just take off for six months and just focus on myself–sleeping, eating, relaxing, exercising–until I get better. But, I don’t have that kind of time, and the issue is, even if I did, I wouldn’t have anywhere to go.

Stuff

helenacampbell — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:26:17 +0000

Argh, I never post anymore…it’s gotten kind of boring to post, for me.
But I have been practicing a bit of chartwork, although I haven’t been doing great–too much work, I guess.
I do it from about 3 feet away and in indoor lighting, I can sometimes get the 20 or 15 line.

I think my neck has been doing a lot better though, it seems like the surface problems are mostly fixed, and the problems that remain are the deep muscles. I had a kinesthiologist work on it for a little bit.
I have also started working out. I remember I was known as “swing girl” in 5th grade because that’s what I would do all recess long. Sitting on the swings, kicking my legs to go up and down didn’t require any thought on my part, and I could totally zone out.
I never did any athletic type things as a child, mostly sat around, so I became weak. I couldn’t even sit up straight in my chair at school, it was too difficult for me.
Does anyone have any ideas for me? I mean, I am doing the usual principles–practicing my chart (which is imperative!), palming occasionally, and not wearing glasses as often as I can, but I feel like I need some new ideas in order to really engage my brain, so that the interest propels me forward.