The homeless guys at the library are always fighting over our magnifying glasses.
Shower: the glasses go on the vanity. I know where everything is in the shower and can find it from memory.
Cat + glasses: No cats right now but it wound up not ever being an issue. I think this was because I had sufficient other stuff on the nightstand (phone, lamp etc.) that the glasses were pretty well walled in.
The rest of the time, the glasses are on my face pretty much nonstop. We were at a Great Wolf Lodge this weekend though, and at times I would leave my glasses when I went to swim - and I nearly fell over something at least once.
OUCH!!! Have you tried Zenni Optical or similar for really cheapo spares? I don’t know for sure if they could do something with such high correction, but it couldn’t hurt.
I once met someone with -13 correction. She was, as it turned out, from Atlanta. I quipped “You have to live in Atlanta - Coke bottles are cheaper there!!”. Fortunately, she thought that was hysterical!
When my gf realizes she forgot to put her $1.99 reading glasses in her purse prior to leaving for the restaurant, she listens to the waitress tell us the specials. If none catch her fancy, she casually asks me to order for both of us.
I have an astigmatism so I’m pretty bad off without my glasses. But it’s not like things go completely dark or anything. I just can’t read or see fine lines.
The longest I go without glasses is when I swim, but there’s nothing to see there anyway. If some fine looking man in a Speedo walks by, I just stare until I figure out all his nuances 
A couple times in the past year I went without glasses while in costume, for about 8 hours each time. It was pretty trippy, like being drunk all day. But I looked much better in pictures! (Not to say that I don’t look good in glasses. I do. But Queen me and Zombie me did not.)
For anyone looking for sunglasses…I got these Cocoons that fit over your glasses and I think they look quite stylish! It’s the first time I’ve been able to wear sunglasses in years.
I’m very short sighted and pretty uncomfortable walking around anywhere without my glasses. I’m one of those who can’t hear people on the phone properly without them either. For the last few years I’ve needed a different prescription for reading and I hated bifocals so I now have three prescription pairs in regular use, normal, reading and sunglasses. I really don’t mind changing them, it’s just nice to have the best kind of vision.
Am I the only person who keeps their glasses on to swim? Actually I know that I’m not, I’ve seen other people wear them in the pool and I caught the habit from my mum.
I’ve twice been the spare part bystander who has retrieved the glasses. Once I gave them back to the patient and once to the paramedic as the patient was still out of it. I’d hope someone would do that for me.
You’re lucky. I look brain-dead without my glasses. I can’t focus, and you can tell from the pictures.
Oooh - I need to GET some of those - it’s so hard to find clip-ons that work these days!!!
Mine is currently -3 and -4. I can tell roughly what time it is at night by whether it is dark or light. I leave my glasses in the same spot so I can find them and put them on when I need to be awake.
I keep a pair of prescription sunglasses and regular glasses in the car as a spare. I keep an old pair in my office desk as well. I have another extra floating around the house just in case.
I feel fortunate that I am not completely useless without my glasses. I can’t go without them long, though. I can read things within a foot or so. Showers are by feel anyway, even if I’m wearing my contacts I don’t really need to see that much.
The worst is losing my glasses and having to find them without them. :rolleyes:
IMO, your GF doesn’t really NEED glasses. She can walk around without them. I envy her. Yeah, she has problems reading…but she can manage to stand up in an unfamiliar place and walk from Point A to Point B without bumping into things.
My husband needs glasses to read, too, and he used to forget them all the time. Now, though, he just keeps a pair in his shirt pocket at all times. I would suggest that your GF get into the habit of carrying glasses in her purse, in a case.
My ex wife is legally blind without corrective lenses.
Basically, at night (she wears contacts but has to take them out at night) she can’t see anything but blobs. It’s that simple. You learn to cope.
I’m also legally blind without my glasses and contacts. I also have cataracts, and the doctor says I will need surgery to remove them. They now implant corrective lenses into the eye, so, God willing, for the first time in 47 years, I will be able to see without glasses or contacts.
But for now, I cope. I know where everything is in my house, so I can get up and go to the bathroom in the middle of the night without putting on my glasses or turning on a light.
But, when things are not in their place, I have troubles. If my glasses are not on my nose, on the nightstand, or in the drawer, I not only don’t have any idea where to search, I cannot see well enough to find them if they merely fell off the nightstand. I have to put in my lenses, find my glasses, yell at whoever moved them, and then take my lenses out and put my glasses on.
I once went for my evening walk without my contacts or glasses. All went fine, except I cannot see if someone is waving to me, or recognize them until they speak to me. So maybe some of the neighbors thought I was being stand-offish. I hope not.
I don’t need to be able to see to shower, and I shave by feel in the shower, so that’s not an issue. I only wear my contacts in the shower when I am not alone, and I wish to enjoy the scenery.
Regards,
Shodan
I’ve worn glasses since I was three. The original problem was cross-eyed but now I have the various problems of age as well. I can function without my glasses for short periods even though my basic vision is horrible. Partly through experience and practice; walk into enough things and you realize just which one in the fog is the “real deal”. That and going to the bathroom at night or to the door without glasses. I can even drive safely short distances without them. Like anything else in life, you learn to adapt.
Well, in a dim restaurant she is unable to read a menu. This has been the case for the last five years or so. I’ve argued for her to carry glasses, but she still forgets. She has dozens of purses, some pretty tiny. Typically she picks a purse to match her outfit, and off we go. Sometimes the purse is totally empty, it is just a fashion thing.
OTOH, if I were to forget my hearing aid, I would not hear the end of it. Literally.
If I don’t know where my glasses are, I have to ask my wife to find them (or go put in my contacts). I mean, I can see well enough to see where the walls are, so I can walk around, but I can’t find anything smaller than, say, a table.
Also, if you are not legally blind with your glasses or contacts, you are also not legally blind without them.
I’m looking forward to getting cataracts, so I can get my eyes fixed!
I would not do Lasik–my eyes are going to get quite enough surgery anyway and those of us with truly horrible eyesight are not good candidates for it (by the time they shave enough off your corneas to make a real difference, you’ve got no corneas left).
I will probably get a retinal detachment or so in the future, and cataracts are quite likely. Glaucoma too!
Mostly, I put my glasses on before I get out of bed. I take them off after I get back in.
I don’t need to see clearly in order to shower. Swimming in a pool, I don’t really need them, I can still see the blur that is the edge of the pool. I am sad that if I swim in tropical waters I can’t really see the fish and coral clearly when snorkeling, unless I want to pay out big bucks for prescription lenses in the mask that I’d use at most once a year.
Eh, she can’t do a specific thing in a specific circumstance. I really don’t think that this is in the same category as not being able to walk on the street, in broad daylight, and not being able to see a curb. Yes, she’s mildly inconvenienced if she forgets to pack her specs, but I don’t think that she really NEEDS glasses in most cases. If she really needed them, she’d make damn sure that she either had them with her at all times, or she’d have multiple pairs and pack them in most purses. It’s like…I make sure that I know where my glasses are at all times, because I really, really need them. I might or might not remember to take my cell phone with me, because it’s not important to my daily functioning. However, I need my glasses…or I’ll need a white tipped cane to tap around my surroundings.
The swimming question really depends on just how dependent on corrective lenses one really is, I think. Do I need to be able to see clearly to swim in a pool? Probably not, in fact I’ll likely have my eyes closed while in the water to prevent chlorine from stinging them. But I do need to see to know where the edge of the pool is, where the ladder or steps are to enter and exit, to avoid other swimmers, to find my towel, etc. If you can mostly manage those things without lenses, great. The difference between not being able to read the hotel name on the towel you laid out and not being able to see that there is a towel at all is a vast difference, though.
To expand on what fachverwirrt was saying, there’s no such thing as legally blind without lenses. The term has a very concrete definition, even though most of us use it colloquially to mean blind as a bat. Legally blind means unable to see better than 20/200 out of the best eye with the best corrective lenses possible, or less than 20 degree field of vision (as opposed to the normal 180 degree.)