For the last 15 years I’ve suffered with ocular migraines, anxiety, panic attacks while driving and in large public places such as malls, supermarkets or any large venue. Trouble with blurred and slight overlapping vision that comes and goes, trouble with comprehending while reading. Issues with balance and walking straight. Constant tension in the muscles around my eyes and neck. These clusters of vague and seemingly unrelated systems ended up being a result of a small vertical eye misalignment that went undetected for half my life.
I had seen countless optometrists and eye specialists describing my symptoms only to be told that I have “20 20″ vision and to be on my way. They only addressed clarity at distance but never looked into whether my eyes were working together as a team or looked for any minor misalignment that could be causing the symptoms I described. I also tried vision therapy which gave a minor improvement but never lasted long and soon reverted back. I even went to a neurologist and Ear nose and throat specialist but nothing came of it.
I stumbled upon a tedtalk on YouTube by Dr Debbie from vision specialists of Michigan in the US who had pioneered a screening process which could detect minor eye misalignments and treat them with very specific amounts of prism in glasses. It’s not your typical 20-minute optometrist appointment, it is a 2-4 hour extremely thorough screening. She described her patients’ symptoms and the impact it’s had on their lives. Sure enough the cluster of symptoms matched mine to a tee. I then contacted her to see if I could get screened here in Sydney. She replied there was only one Australian doctor who had flown to America to learn her methods of measuring and treating these misalignments and that was Dr Andrew Taylor.
Being that I had seen too many eye Drs that I care to name in Sydney to no avail, I booked my flights for Perth and took a leap of faith.
I arrived in his office greeted by his friendly staff and was taken in for screening. After a couple of hours of a very detailed and involved testing he had Identified a small vertical misalignment in my left eye which was causing my problems. He mentioned that minor vertical misalignments in particular go undetected with regular tests and the body struggles to compensate for such alignments resulting in the symptoms I was experiencing.
He put on a trial pair of prisms and I immediately felt an improvement. I was seeing the world in true 3d and most of my symptoms improved. Being a trial frame, it still needed a couple of tweaks over the course of the next day to fine tune it to the right script. When I received my pair of prism glasses the next day, I was in awe of how my symptoms had mostly disappeared. My whole body felt relaxed, I was walking straight, my reading comprehension improved and my general feeling of anxiety/ fight or flight feeling had dissipated. I actually enjoyed walking through a nearby Kmart for once, uncrippled by my visual confusion, feelings of anxiety and disorientation.
I find it sad that conventional optometry hasn’t made these screening techniques and treatment strategy mainstream. To think of all the people out there like me who go their whole lives suffering with these cluster of debilitating symptoms and never get properly evaluated. If your symptoms match what I listed above and also if you’ve been told by people that you cut them off while walking, then it may be worth getting checked by Dr Taylor. It could literally change the way you perceive the world around you and improve your life in ways that you cannot fathom. After all, our eyes are the main way in which we create the world around us and if they are not working properly together then you have no idea what you’re missing. Watch the channel ” vision specialists of Michigan” on YouTube to educate yourself on the condition and whether it sounds like you or someone you know. Thank you Dr Taylor and to your wonderful team.
Charly, Sydney.