Vision Update!

So time to update you guys again on my vision! You guys probably can see that my photography has been picking up quite a bit the previous year into this year! In the past, you probably know I've struggled with really severe visual snow syndrome since the end of 2018, to the point I was half reliant on a white cane during the day, and completely reliant on a white cane at night (by the end of 2019). The good news is towards the end of 2021, I found an experimental treatment for visual snow from the Visual Snow Initiative (non-profit).

Visual Snow Syndrome (VSS) is a poorly understood, and rare condition, that seems to be caused by parts of the visual cortex being overactive. There is also correlation between VSS, PTSD, and migraines (which are all conditions that I have). There is usually no physical damage to the eyes itself (my eyes are physically healthy). The condition causes nyctalopia (night blindness), distorted and noisy vision, photophobia, and various other symptoms. I had nyctalopia, distorted vision, noisy vision, photophobia, and various other symptoms at one point or another during these years. 

I recovered most of my vision during the day, and my night vision works normally for approximately 2 months after the treatment. The main cause for this recovery is because of the Visual Imagery Project (experimental treatment) from the Visual Snow Initiative. The treatment consists of 20 different videos, around 30 minutes long, and feature different kinds of flashy patterns which is probably enough to induce seizures in some individuals. I suspect it works by inducing "micro-seizures" into the brain of the viewer, somehow resetting something inside the visual cortex (but this is just my speculation). I watch those videos daily in a dark room on my computer screen. I had to repeat the treatment sessions several times (and I'm still currently repeating them), and I slowly recovered little by little.

The secondary cause for my recovery is probably because I have been meditating which has been helping me sleep better at night, and has also been lessening my PTSD symptoms. I have been diagnosed with PTSD, and while I'm not professionally diagnosed with complex PTSD, I think my particular variant falls under the complex PTSD category. Complex PTSD is very hard to treat. I'm still doing quite a bit of unhealthy avoidance for my PTSD as well. I have been a bit less stressed over all, despite PTSD still being a huge problem in my life.

You'll probably see above, I said, "I recovered most of my vision", with emphasis on most. So what quirks are still left with my vision?

1. My night vision only remains normal for approximately 2 months after treatment. A while back, I got 3 months out of the treatment sessions. I usually know when I'm due for another treatment session when I start noticing degradation in my night vision. The degradation happens slowly, and I generally start responding to treatment around 3 to 5 days into the sessions, so I do have some leeway.
2. My close up vision kind of works, but also kind of doesn't. My eye muscles fatigue pretty easily, they seem kind of weak. My eyes also seem to hunt for focus somewhat at a distance of 2 feet to 3 feet in front of me, which is somewhat annoying, as it slows me down somewhat when I'm trying to perform a task at this distance in front of me. This problem becomes even more prominent when I'm seeing up close for a long time. This is a little bit annoying, but I can get around this by taking frequent breaks and if I'm reading, enlarging the text digitally. I can technically see normal sized text and small print now, but it causes my eyes to fatigue faster. I think this might recover slowly as I suspect my eye muscles atrophied somewhat from me not using them for a few years back when visual snow was really severe and caused partial blindness.
3. I seem to have lost some of my overall colour perception. What I see looks a bit like an old washed out photograph. If I had to put a number on it, I seem to have lost around 25% of my colour perception and saturation.
4. I still have a tiny bit of noise in my vision, but it seems to be noise I have had all my life. It doesn't really affect anything.
5. Migraines will often cause my vision to temporarily degrade. Migraines will often cause a temporary flare-up of visual snow symptoms along with migraine auras. The amount of temporary vision degradation caused by migraines seem to vary every time. Luckily, since my weight loss, I don't get migraines very often these days (usually once every 1 to 2 months).

Due to the nature of the experimental treatment, nothing is known about the long term effects of it. At the time of writing, my mostly recovered day time vision has been stable for approximately a year. As mentioned before, my night time vision works for approximately 2 months after treatment, and once my night vision starts slowly degrading again, I know it is time for another treatment session. My vision could destabilize again, but as of right now that experimental treatment has been working like a miracle.