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It's a roller coaster of emotion, but you're not alone.

You're still you. You're still loved. You're still worthy of respect. You still matter.

And you're going to be okay.

## Remember to breathe

Stop.

Take a deep breathe in.

Slowly exhale.

Repeat as necessary until your thoughts and emotions are back in balance.

## You can handle this

You have been handling things well so far and there is every reason to believe you will continue to.

You are still alive.

You still have one good eye and even hope for the damaged eye. Even if vision in your damaged eye is never restored your life will continue largely unchanged. You may have to make some adjustments to how you do some things but you should be able to continue to do everything you did before the accident without too much adjustment.

And as far as visible scars go, learn to see the benefit. They are built in attention getters and ice breakers. They mean people will notice and remember you and that you will immediately have something to talk about as you start to get to know each other.

You may have more issues dealing with being traumatized than with the injury itself. If you think talking to someone professionally may help be sure to let you physician know. Be sure to explicitly say you want to talk to someone like a counselor or phycologist or they may just try to medicate you.

## Practical advice about workplace injury

If you are in the US :

Get a consult or advisory session with a workers' comp attorney to help you understand what your rights and options are. Be sure to let them know that you want advice and are not looking to sue at this time. Your rights and options will vary from state to state.

## Remember to breathe when you need to and know that you can do this

Good luck and remember to enjoy the day.

First of all, I'm sorry to hear about traumatic eye injury -- sudden, unexpected changes in vision are definitely events that make you reflect on life. Since everyone has differing experiences with vision loss (i.e., extent, cause, impacts), I can only speak on my behalf of my own experiences which you might find to be useful.

I was born with a genetic retinal disease that causes rapid shifts in visual acuity only at specific ages. Despite being at 20/80 (corrected) for the better part of a decade, I recently had one of those quick vision losses and am now at 20/150 (corrected) with the expectation I'll be legally blind in less than a month. The process of coping with this change has been incredibly complex and has required me to find other methods to approach every aspect of my life -- from reading and writing to navigating around with new assistive technologies. I have also startled relying more on the various low-vision academic/government/state programs that exist. Not being able to drive is a definite downside; however, there are always people to help out (true friends will stand out during these times) or different modes of transportation to fill in the gaps. I still have insecurities about my abilities and independence, but I have found that putting yourself out there and countering stereotypes of what people with visual impairments are capable of is a great motivator. Lastly, I just try to make the most out of life and enjoy every day to its fullest!

Final thoughts: You are way stronger than you think! The fact that you are able to speak about your perspective so openly clearly shows your will to make the best of this unfortunate situation and find support -- that is the most difficult first step. Just know going forward there is always a community here for you to turn to. <3

I’m sorry you’re going through this. I became unilaterally vision impaired suddenly at 29 from a spontaneous retinal detachment. It’s a big change but you will get through this all right. The biggest thing for me was being open to change (good and negative) and keeping a positive mindset. If your retina is detached the surgery may help a lot. It’s hard to know. Lean on your friends and if you have a higher power during this time and connect with other VI people. You’re definitely not alone in having this experience randomly and at your age and a community can help you process that

You should be fine, if you have vision with one eye you should be fine, not considered legally blind at that point.

I had vision in only one eye for about a year before eventually becoming fully blind. It is definitely scary at first and takes some getting used to, but you will adapt and adjust in no time. Advice that everyone can use fully cited or not, is making sure to take care of iHealth, and not overworking your eyes by causing fatigue. We are living in a digital world that finds us being surrounded by electronic screens of all different sorts. Do not cause unnecessary strain by staring at screens like computer monitors, the phone, televisions, and tablets while in the dark. Our eyes are muscles and need to be worked properly by adjusting to all of the surroundings. Getting out in nature and away from screens is good for our eyes so that it can constantly be adjusting to things at different distances. If you have apps on your phone or computer that can be changed to dark mode, it helps a bit with a strain as well so you are not staring at a bright white background. I know that you are going to do great and own it! Don’t let this define you, and always be yourself. Your confidence and personality will outshine all of it!

Hey! What you're going through sucks. I'm sorry this happened. I'd like to offer you a little hope: I know two people who only have vision on one eye. One of them is my mother. She told us already when we were kids that one of her eyes doesn't work and was (still is) frightened for her other eye. Other than that? I never even noticed. If she hadn't told me I probably wouldn't have found out at all. Really: Neither as a kid nor as an adult I even noticed that she didn't have a field of depth. Sure, she might not have been the best in table tennis. But neither am I, who cares. As I kid I was pretty oblivious that the sight lf my mother isn't that great, because for her every day business that didn't (and still doesn't) matter at all. I only noticed because she was afraid of losing her other eye.

Now take my kid for example. He's fully blind and will never see. It's not hard for hil, because it's simply his reality. He grows up like any other kid. Sure, we have to adjust some stuff, but I'm sure he'll live a happy and good life.

Take my grandmother on the other hand who went blind when she was around 80. She never really adjusted, didn't want to use a cane and only very late got used to some adjustments. She was too old and stubborn to relearn things (I still love her, but she is very stubborn) and also didn't accept for years that she had to do stuff differently.

You're still young. You can easily adjust to that. You only have one functioning eye? I'm not going to tell you that's not an issue, but I'm sure you'll not even notice in some time yourself and will (mostly) live on as you did before. Even the depth of field is relearnable for you.

If you ever lose your other eye, that would suck. But as another poster said: The transition is hard, but you can live a good and nice life without sight. The other is true aswell: You can live a bad and miserable life with sight. The question is: What do you do? How do you adjust? What's your perspective?

I can't give you any medical advice or other help, but I think you got this!

I had experienced the almost identical thing last year, at age 27.

Traumatic injury as well, retina detached and another surgery taken as well.

I obtained my master degree in CS last year and all that happened 4 months after graduation.

After 7 months now I can tell you everything is fine. the quality of life is 90% same like as other both eyes sighted people.

You are right that this is gonna change your life very much. But we can move on. Many legally blind (both eyes) friends here in this subreddit living their peaceful lives.

I do not claim to know what you're going through, but you still have your other eye you can still see, it will be just a bit harder to perceive depth, nothing will change regarding your independence, although I think you cannot drive with one eye, but it's still too soon your eye might heal. people here struggle with vision loss, having one eye is nothing compared to vision impairment and blindness, A lot of us would love to have a functioning eye. If you are concerned about how your eye looks don't worry the tissue outside heels and it's very normal after trauma and surgery for it to look messed up but the white part heels, although looks wouldn't be my biggest concern. Final advice take care of your good eye

Sorry you had to go through this. I hope your eye recover quickly. I dealt with a retinal detachment when I was a kid and had multiple follow up surgeries to keep it intact. From what I can tell, it will be fine. The only thing I'd miss is 3D films which suck anyway, might pass on the entire metaverse thingy. We will learn to grow through our insecurities. I could say in a positive way, the whole experience taught me more about life than anything else! :)