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My Defect
By peace | April 16, 2007
Singapore is one of the most shortsighted populations in the world. At least 25% of the nation, or one in four Singaporeans suffers from myopia. I am one of them. Myopia is the scientific name for the common problem of nearsightedness or shortsightedness.
My only defect is my eyes. I have myopia and astigmatism. The myopic eye is an eye which sees more clearly for near than for distant objects. The symptoms for myopia is blurred distance vision. Without spectacles, everything around me is blurred. Vision is not clear to me. When I was studying, I could not see the blackboard clearly. I was told to go to the optician to make spectacles to correct for my nearsightedness. Since the age of ten I have been wearing spectacles.
My shortsightedness was always increasing — the degree went up year after year. It stabilised when I was roughly around the age of sixteen to eighteen. My power was around 500 degrees to 600 degrees for both eyes. So basically I am ‘blind’ without my spectacles. Wearing spectacles is tiring and ‘ugly’. It is sometimes or most of the time difficult to match with my clothings. Making-up is difficult and troublesome with the spectacle too. Soon I have my first pair of contact lense at the age of eighteen or nineteen.
Contact lenses are small, thin, disc-shaped or bowl-shaped lenses designed to fit over the cornea of the eye to correct poor vision due to refractive errors. My first pair of soft lenses were prescribed to correct both my myopia and astigmatism. It cost a lot and I had to clean it everyday. Every week I need to ‘remove proteins’ from the contact lens. The one pair of lens were used for a year or more. Every month I have to buy solution for storage and cleaning the lens.
Wearing extended wear lenses daily for about eight years, switching from brands to brands in the interval, I switched to disposable lenses a few years back. There are various brands of disposable lenses. I have tried Acuvue, Baush & Lomb, Biomedics and Ciba Vision. The last two, Biomedics and Ciba Vision is my favourite. I am not suited for Baush & Lomb. One of the best contact lenses which I have worn so is focus dailies. Unlike other contact lenses, it provides me comfort and ‘extended wear’. There are both monthly disposable and daily disposable. There are colour tinted too.
Wearing contact lenses is so much more comfortable than spectacles. Wearing disposable contact lenses are so much more convenient than the yearly normal contact lens. I have tried monthly disposable and now I want to try daily disposable!
