Assumptions

My doctor says, “You have to choose — phone or computer? Which do you want to see?”

I get asked this every year. My near vision and far vision prescriptions started diverging a decade ago, and the solution has been a combination of contact lenses for far vision with glasses on top for near vision. It’s both complicated and imperfect.

And as my prescriptions get further apart, I need reading glasses to see more and more – including my kids’ faces.

So last week, I decided to try something different. My right eye wears a contact lens for distance vision, and my left eye wears a contact lens for near vision. My brain can filter out the blur giving me perfect 20/20 vision for distance and my selected near target. I didn’t even know I had that superpower!

Even with this strategy, I still have to choose my near vision target. So, my doctor asked me again last week – phone or computer?

And for the first time, I noticed the assumption built into that question.

“I want to see my daughter’s face,” I answered.

And a few hours later, I did — and she’s even more beautiful than I thought.

It’s easy when we’re dealing with chronic challenges like my vision and my daughter’s autism to fall into the trap of letting the healthcare system decide our outcomes with their assumptions about our goals.

We can dramatically improve our quality of life by being mindful of what we want and communicating those goals clearly to the people we hire to help us get there.

What do you want?

If your answer includes better outcomes for autism, Sensory Bionics is there to help you.