The majority of people in this world are born with the ability to see. Frequently,
people are born without eyesight, and many more lose it at some point in their lives.
Christina Ferrell graduated from CHS in ’97. She participated in marching band, and was acknowledged in the band and throughout the school for her ability to play to clarinet. Upon her graduation, she received a $1,000 scholarship, the Young Artist Award.

Three months
Ferrell, 22, starting losing her eyesight four years ago. “It was obvious that I had lost a ton of vision. It just bottomed out. I didn’t know which eye it was. I didn’t know what was going on. All I knew was that I had lost a significant amount of vision and did not know why,” Ferrell said.

In September of her freshman year at Ball State, Ferrell went to a routine optometrist appointment, and everything was fine. However, between that appointment and November, she had already lost the majority of her vision.

“At that point I went to my optometrist again thinking maybe I needed contacts replaced or needed stronger care or something. Then he took my glaucoma pressure. In my right eye, the pressure was 38. Normal fluid pressure for eyes is between 10 and 20. Needless to say, there was a problem,” Ferrell said.

That evening Ferrell went directly to her glaucoma specialist. He diagnosed her with glaucoma and informed her that she would lose all of her eyesight.

“I was 18 years old. I just started college, you know, all of this new stuff. Then, I go home for an eye appointment, and somebody tells me I am going to be blind within the next four months unless I did something right then,” Ferrell said.

“I left the doctors office after I had sat there and been told I was going blind. I was just a wreck. So, I am driving home trying to stay on the road on a cell phone calling everyone completely a wreck. It was horrible.”

As any family would be, the Ferrells were very concerned. “I got a phone call from Chrissy stating that she was on her way to a glaucoma specialist because she has glaucoma. I was totally surprised. We said we need a second opinion. Our efforts were more toward what are we going to do about this,” Ferrell’s mother, Tammy Ferrell, said.

Extraction surgery
Ferrell was on medication for the following two weeks to try to reduce her eye pressure down, but the attempts failed. On Dec. 10, 1997 she went through her first two eye surgeries on her right eye in an operation called a clear lens extraction.

“The glaucoma procedure they did failed, which is why I lost all the vision because between December and the following May, which is when I had the second surgery done, I had lost all the vision. Glaucoma works very fast,” Christina said.

Since the surgeries, all of the vision in Christina’s right eye disappeared.

During her May 10, 1998 surgery, Christina had a glaucoma implant put into her eye. “It looks basically like a stingray. The tube goes down into your eye, and the fluid drains out through the tube and then it gets dispersed by the flat part. It is my plumbing system,” Christina said. According to Christina, a pinpoint of vision remains in her right eye probably because of that implant.

Positive reaction
“It has changed my life for the better. I don’t think I’d have the same outlook on life. I don’t take things for granted anymore. Sometimes walking up and down stairs is a real event, depending on the lighting and whether or not I can actually see the stairs.”

So I don’t take for granted waking up in the morning and seeing a beautiful day or looking at certain people and taking for granted that I can see their face. Knowing that could be taken away any day it has completely changed my attitude,” Christina said.

Christina does not play the clarinet anymore. “Being a musician you play on all different kinds of stages, in all different atmospheres. I mean you are not really sure what the lighting is going to be, and it’s very, very difficult, being principal of your section and you are the one who is supposed to lead everybody and you can’t even see your music. It became a very difficult task to see the music. I had different kinds of glasses, and I tried everything. I was exhausted,” Ferrell said.

Christina has difficulties with many things. “Sometimes it’s difficult to read, very difficult to read. Sometimes even watching TV, my eyes get so blurry it’s hard to see the TV. Steps and stairways are frustrating,” Christina said.

“Usually I get frustrated and then just take a moment. I realize everything is fine and just keep going. There is no point in letting it get to me because there is nothing I can do about it.

A shoulder to lean on
A lot of times what has worked is the advice I got from my mother and my fiancé. They say to basically take 15 minutes to feel completely sorry for yourself, have your own pity party and cry your eyes out or whatever it takes for 15 minutes. Then put it away and be done with it. The important thing to remember is that glaucoma may deteriorate your eyes, but it doesn’t deteriorate you as a person.”

“Glaucoma is what she has, not who she is,” Tammy said.

Since her diagnosis, Christina has randomly made many seeing-impaired friends. Also, she continues to be fairly open about the effects of the disease and the disease in general. She has transferred schools and is currently studying finance at Northern Kentucky University. She worked with the blind and the Braille system in music for a while as well.
Christina has taught herself beginning Braille. “The problem is there weren’t classes to take. There are two major places for the blind, the Cincinnati Institute for the Blind and one other place. Neither one of those offers any classes, which is really, really sad because you can walk into the bookstore and find about 100 books on the deaf and sign language and not one on the blind.

The book I got was a children’s book, and that helped me,” Christina said. There is a publishing company that publishes books in Braille. This company doesn’t publish many more books other than textbooks for schools though, because it is a volunteer organization.
Christina gives advice to others who are not seeing-impaired. “If you ever see anyone who has a cane or a dog, who is struggling and looks like they are blind, help them, don’t watch them suffer. Those people shouldn’t be ridiculed or laughed at because they have a cane or a dog. It’s not funny,” Christina said.

What is glaucoma?
By Lauren Vandeveer

Between 2,000 and 3,000 Americans suffer from glaucoma, and one would not know if one had it, because there are no symptoms in the initial stages. When people realize they finally have glaucoma, it is already too late. Doctors can not restore what has already been lost.
Today there are two commonly known types of glaucoma. The most common type which affects 85 percent of the cases in the United States, is chronic or open-angle glaucoma. Closed-angle, or acute, glaucoma comes on much more suddenly and is less common.
In every person’s eye, approximately a teaspoon of clear fluid is produced daily to wash and nourish the lens and cornea. The fluid is then drained from the eye to a spongy tissue at the edge of the iris. In the disease glaucoma, the passage becomes blocked, thus producing pressure to build up within the eye.

As a result, blurred vision or blindness occurs because of damage due to the optic nerve. Doctors are baffled as to why the eye’s drainage system becomes clogged.

Glaucoma occurs when the fluid pressure is too much for the eye to handle. In some cases, above-normal pressure will not cause harm to the optic nerve, and in other people normal pressure is too much for their eye to handle.

When glaucoma settles and starts to react within a person, it affects the mid-peripheral range of vision. For example, if a person is looking at a chair and someone walks by, the person viewing the chair would not have noticed the person walking by if the viewer is suffering from glaucoma.

Currently, glaucoma does not have a cure. There are treatments, however. When a person first notices blurred vision, eye drops are prescribed to sedate further vision loss.

Surgery is suggested. The purpose is to relieve the eye pressure by making a tiny hole is the white part of the eye. Laser surgery is recommended to enable drainage.

This disease is not contagious, it is the body’s own malfunction or a gene that causes glaucoma. Like all diseases, doctors are constantly trying to find a cure or a prevention method to stop glaucoma.

Are you at High risk?
• More than 40 years old
• African-American
• Diabetic
• Glaucoma family
history