Getting Things in Focus

This week has been about getting things in focus.  

Three weeks ago, I underwent cataract surgery on my left eye.  I'd been having constant headaches and my left eye wasn't able to focus.  The ophthalmologist told me that I could get glasses--several pair.  I could get one for close up reading, one for computer, one for seeing the music when I played the piano, one for seeing far for when I drove the car.  

Never one to go the simplest route, I asked if there was something that could be done.  He explained that one possibility was to have the cataracts removed from both eyes and new lenses put in place.  

The chance to see again without glasses made me feel light headed with relief.  Brent battles with two pair of glasses--one for reading, one for computer work.  I don't know how he does it.  About three years ago I had two pair of glasses made up--one that would allow both eyes to see close up and one that would give both eyes far sight.  

I know that I used them--especially the ones for reading--but I have no idea of where they are now.  

But back to my subject:  focus.  

I was rather disappointed that I didn't have perfect sight in my left eye a few days after the operation.  When I had LASIK correction about 9 years ago, I was able to see clearly the next day.  Of course it was a little different then.

Because of my astigmatism, the doctor gave me mono-vision:  left eye for reading, right eye for seeing distance.  That meant that the muscles in both eyes didn't need to move in order for me to see.  In essence, by the time that the cataract was removed, my eyes didn't know how to work any more.

When I complained to my doctor--he told me that I needed to exercise them--do "pencil pushups."  Since that visit, I have been purposefully trying to practice focusing on things distant, then close up . . . again and again.  I was in the car on the way to Lowe's (or Home Depot), Brent was driving.  I put my index finger up as if I were pointing to the sky.  I held it at arm's length and then brought it up close to my nose.  Back and forth, back and forth . . . until Brent glanced over and asked me what I was doing.  

I then explained everything that I just went through in the last few paragraphs.  He remarked that his eye muscles must also be atrophied since he'd had LASIK done on both eyes about a year before I had mine done.  

So now the both of us periodically stop and use our index finger to make our eye muscles become stronger.  

For the last 7 years, I have been receiving shots in my lower back for a lot of reasons.  Surgery, as it is now, is not an option to relieve the constant pain.  After a shot I got about a year ago, I asked my pain management doctor if I could have a script for physical therapy--in the hope that strengthening my core muscles would lengthen the time between shots.  

I began therapy with a full time physical therapist, who was accustomed to working with patients 25 to 30 years older than me. By his standards, I ready to graduate from his care in about 6 weeks.  But instead of releasing me completely, he introduced me to a Pilates instructor who had worked with patients of his before.  

She began a year long process of strengthening my lower and mid-back muscles as well as my stomach and oblique muscles.  I cannot remember my last pain shot.  I am stronger and fitter than I have been . . .  ever.  Bonnie (my instructor) had the experience and skill to begin slowly and then to emphasize larger and larger groups of muscles.  

I do have pain still--mostly after a long airplane ride.  My core muscle group is resilient enough, though, to allow me faster recovery and release from pain.

I look at my eye exercises in the same way.  With my goal to see clearly both close up and far away with the same eye, working my eyes, it may take time, but I will be able to focus as I want.

Focusing on the ability to focus . . . working to be able to see what is around me without impairment . . . involves effort I have never made before.  It is a constant, enduring kind of thing--kind of like what I need to be doing to live the Gospel principles that I know to be true.  

I am trying to focus on people around me, too:  stretch the boundaries that have gradually built up around me to look at people and what they are, who they are.  

The Church sponsors a kind of AA program, Addiction Recovery Program.  We meet once a week for an hour.  I am there to work on my own addiction to safety and reclusion.  I never know when my body is going to begin to deteriorate, to hurt in new and terrible places.  I do not have control over a my manic depression will spiral out of the reach of my med's effective range. I have been in situations where I have become involved in social and school and Church activities--and then crashed.  I pull myself into my shell and wait to begin to heal.

I have learned patience.  

When Relief Society Sunday lessons focused on becoming more patient, my reaction was always to pray that each day would require no more patience than I already had.

As with my back and core muscles, it has taken a very long time for me to attain a level of patience that is able to meed the needs of each day.  Without focusing on it, patience has snuck up on me and claimed my heart.

I am working on stretching that ability to face things that were impossible before--to turn my focus from myself and my needs to those around me, without worrying and holding back in case my body or mind surrender their strength.  

The photos above were taken after a Botany lab class last Tuesday.   One shows that collection of ideas and things that lay about me as I finished class.  The other shows the composition I was able to refine after looking closely and focusing my attention on what was most enchanting, most piquant about what we had done and seen that class.

A choice to focus--choosing what I focus on--both inside and outside of myself.

Continuing to focus on what is important--I still go to Pilates Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 7 to 8 in the morning.

I still take my meds for manic depression and narcolepsy, hypothyroidism, (and now cholesterol).  I still read the scriptures and make a conscious effort to pray more meaningfully.  I still look for something I can do every day to make the world better--even if it is just picking up a few pieces of discarded plastic off the ground and putting it into the trash or recycling bin--thanking the grocery clerk for working so late when I shop after 9 pm--watching for Brent and Nathan and Lauren and Megan to do things that I can thank or praise them for.  I am trying to make friends with the other students in my classes.  My calling as a Cub Scout (Webelos) is now constantly at the back of my mind--what to focus on--how to encourage them to stretch their physical and mental and spiritual muscles.

Focus.

See more clearly.

Focus.