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Home | Your community | Blogs | Sandi Wassmer | Finding a great optician has been a life changing experience for this visually challenged girl

Posted in Sandi's blog on 2 February 2010 | 1 Comments

It is just one of those things that most people don’t get. If I am blind, why the heck do I wear glasses? Well, since only 3% of those registered blind in the UK have no vision at all, the rest of us do have some useful vision. As the Retinitis Pigmentosa only affects the back of my eyes, at the front, the lens has always required correction and, using glasses or contact lenses does improve the useful vision that I’ve got.

But, finding an optician that understands about RP, is willing to take the time to work with me to get the best outcome and who is also willing to put up with my weird and wonderful OCD-like phobias about my eyes has not been easy. My experience in the past has been that opticians are the poor relations of ophthalmologist and that once someone like me enters their premises, it is a foregone conclusion; Dispensing glasses to me always felt like putting a plaster on a gunshot wound.

Then, completely by chance, I went into Richard Peters Opticians with my son to have his eyes tested. They were lovely, very personable and professional and so we all started going there. For the first time since the RP has taken hold, I felt understood. They took my specific needs into consideration and did not try to impose any sort of standard treatment on me. They took time to get to know me and tailored what they did to suit my requirements. I realise that this should be the case whatever, but that seems to be just a theory.

But that’s not all. It only gets better.

I have been struggling with glare for quite a while now, and as my ophthalmologist has provided no solutions, I have muddled through with some rather odd home brewed ones, all of which have left me feeling quite frustrated. I have been using regular sunglasses to help with the headaches that bright light causes, so decided to pop into the opticians to find out about getting some prescription sunglasses.

It was a Saturday, about a half an hour before closing time, but this did not stop Richard from spending over an hour with me, talking through the issues I was having and working with me to find the optimum solution and, optimum is an understatement. He showed me polarised lenses, which completely cut out the glare. It was incredible. It was like someone simply removed the two flashlights that were being held directly in front of my eyes. Goodbye flashlights. Goodbye headaches. Hello calm. Wow.

It is not like polarised lenses are anything new, so am a little baffled as to why nobody else thought to mention them, but fortunately, my optician is highly skilled, has lots of experience and is excellent at his job and this seemed an obvious option to him. He also didn’t skirt around the issues and was open and honest, which has further engendered my trust in him and made me realise what an important relationship this is and how lucky I am to have found him.

About Sandi

Businesswoman Sandi Wassmer registered blind in 2008. In her blog, she shares with us the 'shenanigans of visual impairment'.

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