A series of articles written by SCCO Student Ambassadors.

When Seeing Clearly Changed Everything

by SCCO Student Ambassador, Genelle Marcelino-Searles

Like most of you, my introduction into optometry began when I found myself squinting to see the board in class. In a family full of myopes, my seven-year-old self had been dreaming of the day when I’d finally get glasses just like my big sister. After getting my first pair, however, I still found myself struggling with reading. I have always been enthralled with fantasy and sci-fi books, but reading didn’t come easy to me. I was able to see each word individually if I focused, but the words on the page just didn’t seem to sit still – jumping around, moving, or disappearing.

For years, I contributed this to my own inattention, working harder to read books that others could breeze through. During my freshman year of high school, however, an optometry clinic opened just 8 minutes from my house that also happened to be the only one to provide vision therapy in the state. After a visit to the new optometrist, I was finally diagnosed with strabismus – esotropia of my right eye.

This marked the beginning of my favorite experience I’ve ever had as a patient in any healthcare setting – my weekly vision therapy sessions. I looked forward to my weekly visits to the clinic where I got to play games! I later found out these games helped train my eyes to work together.

After around a year and a half of these sessions, my eye strength had grown exponentially. My eyes were working together, and I was finally able to speed through endless novels painlessly. Not only did my reading ability improve, but I also found that so many different aspects of my life had as well. From my coordination issues (lots of bruises down to just a few) to daily headaches, achieving binocular vision fixed so many different issues that most people don’t even realize are eye-related!

Vision isn’t just about being able to see clearly, and my experience as a vision therapy patient taught me that there is so much more to the world of optometry than just refractions. As an optometrist, you can fundamentally change how a person experiences the world.

If you are a prospective optometry student, I encourage you to explore as many different types of practices as you can! Learning about the depth of the career can truly enhance the passion you feel for the field as well as teaching you about what you can do for patients.

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