ALONE AGAIN

My wife has left me again.

No, not as in “she’s left me for another man”. Or “She’s left me for good tp get a divorce.”

My wife has flown back home to Denver once again for a week of work. You see, my wife is a hairdresser, and a damn good one at that. So good that she does clients hair in two different time zones. In addition to her Rochester clients at Beauty Plus salon in Greece Ridge Mall, she flies back to do her Denver clients every six weeks, then flies back home to the Roc.

What this means to me is that I am left to fend for myself, which I have to admit is getting tougher and tougher to do.You see, I am legally a blind person.

Many of you know this from my past columns, or by knowing me personally, but it may come as news to some of you, especially my twits, or my Twitter haters who read my column and I think still believe I am somehow lying about that (why anyone would lie about being blind is beyong me, but these morons apparently think that judging by their responses).

Anyways, I wanted to talk a little about what it is to be going blind. Maybe this will be enlightening to some of you. If not, I apologize, and I will get back to sports next article.I have something called Choroideremia. This is a genetic disease that I got from my mother. Women are the carrier of this faulty gene, and there is nothing I can do about it. There is no pill I can take. There is no surgery I can get. The photo-receptor cells in the choroid layer of the retina are slowly dying off because my body doesn’t produce the special protein that nourish them.

Five years ago, I had about 17 degrees of usable center vision in each eye. Now I am down to about ten, and it is dropping rapidly. Without a cure or a treatment, I will eventually lose my sight altogether.

I used to see perfectly when I was a kid. I played sports. I drove a car. I went to college. I lived by myself . I did it all, and I did it easily.

That has all changed.

I used to love living alone. I loved the freedom and independence. Now, each time I get left alone, it gets tougher and tougher, and more and more stressful.Making things even harder is the fact that I have to take care of our four dogs (shhh, don’t tell anyone), and three cats.For most people, this is no problem. For me, it’s a nightmare.

The cats are indoor cats, so I can’t let them out of the house, and they are crafty little buggers…they try. So I have to find them, and put them in a closed room every time I have to let the dogs out. With my eyes, that’s about as easy as you trying to find two mice in a football field at three in the morning. They like to hide in their many hiding places in the house, and are no longer good driven to come out when I shake the treat bag. Needless to say, this will be an interesting week.

Now add in the other issues.Trying to cook for myself is getting more and more difficult. Trying to read the small instructions on the back of frozen dinners in the bright red backgrounds on the box is a chore.

Remembering where I put the salt and pepper shakers, then having to find them if I forgot. God forbid I lose the TV or cable remote. That sometimes takes an hour to find. If a fuse blows out in the house, it could be a couple of hours to fix. An hour or two to find a flashlight, and maybe another hour or so to figure out which switch to flip on the fuse box.

Feeding the dogs. Scooping the litter boxes, by feel mainly, if I can’t see the box well. Everything gets harder for me. There are so many things that could go wrong, and the stress gets to me more each time.

Want to know the worst part of it all? It’s that I know all of this is only going to get worse. I wish there was some way to explain the heartbreak and frustration that goes with that. To know that all of these things I have taken for granted for so long, and even now can still do, may eventually become impossible tasks for me.

All I can hope for is the research that is being done. A phase one clinical trial for an idea that could at least halt the progression of this disease is supposed to start up next January at the University of Pennsylvania. I am hoping to be a part of that trial. So are all my brothers in blindness who have what I have. It’s not the only hope we’ve got, but it is a huge hope.

I am not going to ask for money. I have done that plenty already. I will provide the website though if anyone wanted to donate. It is [www.curechm.org.](http://www.curechm.org./)

Why am I writing this? I don’t know. Partly just to explain how I am feeling right now. The other part of it though is as a warning to you. You are all one wrong turn or doctors visit from being in the same boat as me. All of those little things that you take for granted now, could all be taken away in a millisecond. I urge all of your healthy people to enjoy each minute of your life, and realize how lucky you are.

Now I’ve got to go find the remote. Wish me luck!