June 14, 2025 • 18 mins
Former BBC man Chris Baxter comes to terms with his diagnosis of AMD. Why is everything looking wavy, is that a needle I see before me? Join Chris on a journey of discovery. Please drop me a line at cbthemacdg@gmail.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
[Music]
(00:04):
Hello, I'm Chris Baxter. This is Macular D-Generate, podcast number one.
[Music]
(00:28):
When I left Radio full time with the BBC last year, I did hope that I'd be able to continue doing some kind of creative audio content.
I didn't know what form that would take, but what I didn't know was that I'd be making a podcast about Macular D-Generation.
That was the last thing on my mind, but hey, this is what I've been looking for, the chance to make some good audio content.
(00:56):
Good, is that the right word? I don't know, I'll have to wait and see.
[Music]
So why have I decided to do this? What's the reason for wanting to do a podcast about Macular Degeneration?
Well, I've just been diagnosed with wet, macular, Degeneration.
With me, it would include the word 'wet', wouldn't it?
(01:19):
There is also the 'dry variety'. There is a joke in there somewhere about the wet variety and the dry variety, but we'll get to that in the coming episodes.
I did know that I had a condition called 'drusen'. Now, 'drusen' is where you get little fatty deposits on your retinas, little bumpy bits.
It was described to me that if I look at straight lines through one eye, some of those lines could look wavy.
(01:45):
And they've been keeping an eye on this, excuse the pun, for quite some time.
So I have to go into hospital and have a scan done and look at this thing called the 'Amsler chart' and tell them if there are any major changes to this grid that you look at, where you see straight lines horizontally and vertically.
And to be honest with you, I kind of put it to one side, really, didn't look at the 'amsel of chart' as much as I should have done.
(02:10):
And just sort of lost concentration with it a bit and thought, 'that will be okay'.
Then in May, I was at work doing some IT work, IT training.
And I got into work and I was looking at a screen and I thought, 'this just doesn't feel right'.
I'd recently had some monitor glasses made up.
(02:31):
So, normally I'd wear very very focus, but this time I was wearing these glasses that I made up just for looking at screens close up and I thought, 'no, this still doesn't look right'.
One of my eyes felt like it was able to focus and I closed the right eye just looking through the left eye and thought, 'yeah, there's a dark patch in the corner'.
(02:53):
Things are going a bit wobbly there. I don't like the look of this and a friend of mine, Mark, who left the BBC, he had a detached retina when he finished work.
And he just sounded like a horrible thing. I mean, he had to have this operation where they put a little gas bubble in your eyeball and you have to lie on your front for whole week.
(03:18):
And the gas bubble pushes the retina back into place. You're allowed up every so often to go to the Lou and to eat and those kinds of things.
It sounded like hell on earth. And I thought, 'oh my goodness, am I going to have to do this? Have I got a detached retina?'
So, I found the opticians and they said, 'come and see us as soon as you can'. Sorry, I did.
And they did a retinal scan and when the optician showed me the image, she said, 'yeah, look, your retina is peeling away from the back of the eye'.
(03:47):
So it's no wonder things are looking a bit weird. And she made me do tests with reading and I said, 'yeah, through my left eye, I just can't see any of that text close up. It's just completely fuzzy. It's bent, it looks weird'.
And she said, 'right, you need to go to hospital'.
So, I thought I'd be rushed in for an emergency appointment, but it took a few days and they were very matter of fact when you get there because they deal with thousands of people who have these conditions.
(04:17):
You know, why should I be special? But you always think it's only ever happening to you, don't you?
Now, one of things, putting aside the operation that this friend of mine had for his detached retina, I had been told in the past that with this condition called drusen, which I explained earlier, there is a possibility that later in life, I would get something called 'Wet Macular Degeneration'.
(04:42):
And I just thought, 'Oh gosh, that'll be when I'm in my 80s or 90s, don't need to worry about this'. They did say the good thing is there is a treatment for it and it's injections into the eyeball.
And I remember at the time, it must have been said to me about 10 years ago, I just thought, 'Oh my God, I'd rather be dead than have an injection into my eyeball'.
(05:03):
I won't let that happen. Surely it would never happen. So I just put that in a little box, stored it away and casually forgot about it.
Anyway, back to hospital, they're putting drops in my eyes, doing checks on the back of the eyes, getting me to read letters like you do it in opticians, and then came the retinal scan.
(05:27):
And I got to see a specialist who was very lovely. And she said that one of those people who laughed at the end of every sentence. So she'd say, 'Yeah, there's definitely a problem here'.
And we are going to have to do something about it. And it's not very pleasant.
You know that kind of person who does that? So I was quite mesmerised by this thing that she was doing.
(05:51):
But anyway, she kind of explained what the optician had, then showed me the picture of the retinal, which had a big lumpy bit in it.
And then she gave me a bit more detail and said, 'Yeah, what's happened is these blood vessels at the back of your eye, they're leaking fluid, the fluid is building up behind the retina, and it's causing a bump'.
(06:13):
So that is making everything look even more bizarre than it did before when you look at the amsela chart. So I had another look and there it was this big bumpy pattern and bulgy bits.
And she said, 'It's wet, macular degeneration. Good news is, we can treat this'.
And the treatment is injections into the eyeball.
(06:35):
And then the question came into my head, 'Is this something that's a few weeks away or is it going to happen now?' Before I could even ask the question, she said, 'So, we'll prepare you for your injection'.
Nice. Out came a sharpie marker. She drew a little arrow down arrow above my left eye.
And said, 'If you'd like to go and wait in the waiting room, then we'll be with you'.
(07:01):
So I sat in the waiting room and noticed that there's several other people with arrows above their eyes, which looked very, very weird.
Katie, my wife was with me, which was very kind of her because I'd originally planned to go and do this whole thing on my own by arriving on the train, but I'm glad I didn't.
So I sat there in the waiting room beginning to feel a bit sick and panicky, thought of a needle going into my eyeball, and yeah, it was just this fear.
(07:34):
But at the same time, thinking, well, there's nothing I can do about this. And they will need to do something to help me.
So, into the room you go, and this is going to sound awful because the people in there were amazing, but the image that came to my mind when I walked into this room and saw a chair,
was you know when they show you news bulletins of countries that have been liberated and they uncover these horrible prisons with torture areas, it looked like a room from that.
(08:04):
You know, like a chair in the middle of the room, I bet now when I go back next time, it'll be really nice and there'll be pictures on the walls and things, but in my mind's eye, that's all I can see this mechanical chair, not even as luxurious as a dentist's chair, you know, where they've got buttons to press and things happen automatically.
And they're made of nice leatherette.
This seems, I think it had a mechanical handle, but I might be making this up.
(08:28):
So, you sit in the chair and this very, very nice professional said, "Are you okay?" I said, "Can I be honest with you? I'm really, really nervous about this."
And she said, "Okay, I get you." She said, "And they introduced themselves." There was her, the person who was going to do the injection and an assistant, "I forget their names now, which makes me feel awful, but I wasn't really paying attention to that."
(08:53):
And she said, "Okay, so where do you live?" I said, "Straud." And then, very cleverly, she started saying, "Oh, Straud, I've always wanted to visit Straud. Tell me what I should do when I go there."
Meanwhile, she was getting everything ready and the assistant was getting everything ready and I was banging on about Straud and saying, "How nice it is and what she could do." And then she said, "Right, here we go.
(09:16):
So, would you like me to take you through exactly what I'm going to do?" And I said, "Yes, actually, I would." I felt like knowledge is power.
So then she explained that they were going to put some anaesthetic drops in my eye and she said, "Because you're nervous, we're going to give you some extras, just to be kind."
(09:37):
And the lady behind me was lovely. She said, "Is I going to look after you, sir?"
And then the lady was doing the injection and then said, "We're going to put a plastic cup on the eyeball."
It looks like a suction cup. She said, "That will stop you from blinking or if you do try and blink, it will blink into the cup rather than the needle."
(10:00):
I guess is the reason for that.
She said, "In the side of this little cup, there's a hole. That's where the needle will go. It'll be very quick. It's very sharp.
You shouldn't feel anything, you might feel some pressure. Normally, when you get injections, they always say to you don't they, they always say, "You'll feel a sharp scratch."
But she did say to me, "You won't feel a sharp scratch."
(10:22):
But whenever I've had an injection, it never feels like a sharp scratch. I don't know why they use that as a description of injections, because it just feels like a painful prick.
You don't like a... I'll do it anyway. So then they put the suction cup on, which makes everything go a bit fuzzy.
And then she said, "Look at my finger and held her finger up to the right of my vision so I was looking that way."
(10:51):
Before I know it, she said, "Here we go. The needle was coming in and she said, "Breathe deeply. That'll help."
And then I felt this pressure. It's a little prick, but it wasn't a painful prick. It was like a little pressure prickly thing and I went, "Oh, are you okay?"
I said, "Yeah, she said it's done. It's done."
So then I was... Oh, before they do all this stuff, by the way, they spread loads of iodine over your eye to stop infection.
(11:21):
So they wipe it all over. So you probably look like you've got a black eye. I didn't get a mirror held up to look.
And then afterwards they wipe that away. They get the sharpie mark off your head and they tell you to be really careful about splashing water in your eye.
You don't want to get an infection where this little hole has been made in your eyeball.
(11:42):
So they're very, very careful about warning you not to have showers and get water in your eye, get a swim and all those kinds of things.
So that all made sense.
And then once they've wiped all this iodine off, which reminded me of all creatures growing small because
James Herat and Seekfried Farman always used to talk about iodine in the surgery. James simply had some more iodine, James, for the surgery.
(12:09):
James has a lack of iodine, James, and he'd say, "Oh, my God, that's my, I'm a little bit hard of an impression, but the iodine is then wiped off."
And then you set free.
And you can't see a thing because your pupil's been dilated. You've got anaesthetic drops in your eye. Everything looks really bright and you'll need somebody to be with you to...
(12:33):
Well, you can't drive.
Next time I'm going to try and go on my own, because I will be able to see where I'm going in terms of walking with the other eye, but it just feels weird.
That's when the nausea kicked in. That's when I thought, "Oh, my God, I've just had a needle shoved in my eyeball."
What the heck? That was horrible. And I went home and I went to bed and I fell asleep and then I woke up with really wet, weepy eye.
(13:01):
And when the anaesthetic wears off, it feels like a piece of grit isn't your eyeball.
Okay, so you feel sorry for yourself a little bit afterwards. I did anyway, because I'm pathetic.
Next day I went to see a friend, I got on the train and I started thinking about this whole thing, thinking, "Did that really happen? Did somebody shove a needle in my eye and inject a drug into my eyeball?"
(13:27):
And I gradually came to terms with it and sort of made peace with it.
And I listened to a very good podcast by the Macular Society about this whole process, listened to some relaxation podcasts about dealing with surgical procedures, lots of information about breathing and thinking about beautiful places.
(13:51):
And I now feel, I mean, I've got another one in a week or so's time, and I now feel that I've made a bit of peace with this whole thing.
Now that I've been through it, now that I've got this done, I feel like I'm okay with the next one.
That's how I feel at the moment, I don't know whether I'm going to be a jibbering wreck when I go in for the next one.
(14:14):
And I did talk to my neighbour, Julian, who said, "He said all my father-in-law had those injections in his 70s and they had to hold him down on the chair because he was screaming like a baby."
And I thought, "Well, at least I didn't do that. At least I just gave her a nice description of how beautiful Stroud is."
So I feel like I'm on track. And the whole idea of this podcast, I suppose, is to keep you in touch with what's happening.
(14:42):
I'm going to say, and for you, if you're going through this yourself, I want to talk to some experts about wet, macular degeneration, dry, macular degeneration as well.
I want to just get the lowdown on all of this and find out more about what might happen in the future, whether or not these injections will save my eyesight for the time being, whether I'm ready to prepare for blindness eventually.
(15:11):
I mean, is that going to be the outcome? Or will I just lose my central vision? I've done quite a bit of reading up on this.
So I'd like to talk about people that might help you get through some of these treatments, some of the experts, people who've survived this and are living with it, positive stories, stories of people who are frightened, people who live with sight loss, I think that would be interesting as well.
(15:37):
So that's the idea of this podcast from a degenerate point of view, that's me, finding out more about macular degeneration and what it means.
I'm doing a course at the moment in learning to be an instructional designer, so it's given me a project to work on a course for beginners in macular degeneration.
(15:59):
So I'm building myself a course all about the subject, which is helping me, it's empowering me with information. So I'd love to hear your thoughts.
I'd love you to leave me a message or whatever you do with podcasts, a like or I don't flip it, no, but you know, it's the first one I've done.
This is something I want to, I want to continue into the future, so I'm hoping that you can join me on this journey. I will let you know how I get on with the next injection, which is coming up very soon.
(16:32):
I was told that with three injections, I might start to see a difference.
I've known the macular society help line yesterday and they said 50% of people might see an improvement after the third injection.
It's not always the case, it might just halt progression from here on in. I haven't found going to work easy. My employer has been brilliant, they've given me a phased return.
(17:01):
So I'm doing four hours a day this week trying to get used to using a computer screen. It is very tiring and all the stuff that I love doing is on the computer, whether it's design work, audio editing.
So I'm live without using screens is a scary one, but I'm sure there are ways that I can adapt.
This whole journey is a place I'll be going with you, hopefully on this podcast, macular degenerates. Thank you for listening. I'd love to hear your comments, I'd love to hear your questions.
(17:32):
Ideas for guests as well. People that I can speak to in the coming weeks would be really interesting.
Who should I talk to? What can we achieve through this discussion? A lot of the podcasts I've listened to are very serious.
That's good because it's a serious subject, but I'd like to think that we can have a bit of fun on the way too.
(17:54):
So we might go into some of these stories at some stage. I want to talk to some people who have good humor about this whole subject.
Because let's face it, you know, there are people who are much worse off.
I know there are. I just think, you know what? This is okay at the moment. This is something I can...
I'm going to be able to deal with with the help and support of friends, with you listening, with being able to talk about it to share it is really important.
(18:22):
Thank you for listening. See you again in the next episode of macular degenerate. I'm Chris Baxter.
[Music]
[BLANK_AUDIO]
[Music]
(00:04):
Hello, I'm Chris Baxter. This is Macular D-Generate, podcast number one.
[Music]
(00:28):
When I left Radio full time with the BBC last year, I did hope that I'd be able to continue doing some kind of creative audio content.
I didn't know what form that would take, but what I didn't know was that I'd be making a podcast about Macular D-Generation.
That was the last thing on my mind, but hey, this is what I've been looking for, the chance to make some good audio content.
(00:56):
Good, is that the right word? I don't know, I'll have to wait and see.
[Music]
So why have I decided to do this? What's the reason for wanting to do a podcast about Macular Degeneration?
Well, I've just been diagnosed with wet, macular, Degeneration.
With me, it would include the word 'wet', wouldn't it?
(01:19):
There is also the 'dry variety'. There is a joke in there somewhere about the wet variety and the dry variety, but we'll get to that in the coming episodes.
I did know that I had a condition called 'drusen'. Now, 'drusen' is where you get little fatty deposits on your retinas, little bumpy bits.
It was described to me that if I look at straight lines through one eye, some of those lines could look wavy.
(01:45):
And they've been keeping an eye on this, excuse the pun, for quite some time.
So I have to go into hospital and have a scan done and look at this thing called the 'Amsler chart' and tell them if there are any major changes to this grid that you look at, where you see straight lines horizontally and vertically.
And to be honest with you, I kind of put it to one side, really, didn't look at the 'amsel of chart' as much as I should have done.
(02:10):
And just sort of lost concentration with it a bit and thought, 'that will be okay'.
Then in May, I was at work doing some IT work, IT training.
And I got into work and I was looking at a screen and I thought, 'this just doesn't feel right'.
I'd recently had some monitor glasses made up.
(02:31):
So, normally I'd wear very very focus, but this time I was wearing these glasses that I made up just for looking at screens close up and I thought, 'no, this still doesn't look right'.
One of my eyes felt like it was able to focus and I closed the right eye just looking through the left eye and thought, 'yeah, there's a dark patch in the corner'.
(02:53):
Things are going a bit wobbly there. I don't like the look of this and a friend of mine, Mark, who left the BBC, he had a detached retina when he finished work.
And he just sounded like a horrible thing. I mean, he had to have this operation where they put a little gas bubble in your eyeball and you have to lie on your front for whole week.
(03:18):
And the gas bubble pushes the retina back into place. You're allowed up every so often to go to the Lou and to eat and those kinds of things.
It sounded like hell on earth. And I thought, 'oh my goodness, am I going to have to do this? Have I got a detached retina?'
So, I found the opticians and they said, 'come and see us as soon as you can'. Sorry, I did.
And they did a retinal scan and when the optician showed me the image, she said, 'yeah, look, your retina is peeling away from the back of the eye'.
(03:47):
So it's no wonder things are looking a bit weird. And she made me do tests with reading and I said, 'yeah, through my left eye, I just can't see any of that text close up. It's just completely fuzzy. It's bent, it looks weird'.
And she said, 'right, you need to go to hospital'.
So, I thought I'd be rushed in for an emergency appointment, but it took a few days and they were very matter of fact when you get there because they deal with thousands of people who have these conditions.
(04:17):
You know, why should I be special? But you always think it's only ever happening to you, don't you?
Now, one of things, putting aside the operation that this friend of mine had for his detached retina, I had been told in the past that with this condition called drusen, which I explained earlier, there is a possibility that later in life, I would get something called 'Wet Macular Degeneration'.
(04:42):
And I just thought, 'Oh gosh, that'll be when I'm in my 80s or 90s, don't need to worry about this'. They did say the good thing is there is a treatment for it and it's injections into the eyeball.
And I remember at the time, it must have been said to me about 10 years ago, I just thought, 'Oh my God, I'd rather be dead than have an injection into my eyeball'.
(05:03):
I won't let that happen. Surely it would never happen. So I just put that in a little box, stored it away and casually forgot about it.
Anyway, back to hospital, they're putting drops in my eyes, doing checks on the back of the eyes, getting me to read letters like you do it in opticians, and then came the retinal scan.
(05:27):
And I got to see a specialist who was very lovely. And she said that one of those people who laughed at the end of every sentence. So she'd say, 'Yeah, there's definitely a problem here'.
And we are going to have to do something about it. And it's not very pleasant.
You know that kind of person who does that? So I was quite mesmerised by this thing that she was doing.
(05:51):
But anyway, she kind of explained what the optician had, then showed me the picture of the retinal, which had a big lumpy bit in it.
And then she gave me a bit more detail and said, 'Yeah, what's happened is these blood vessels at the back of your eye, they're leaking fluid, the fluid is building up behind the retina, and it's causing a bump'.
(06:13):
So that is making everything look even more bizarre than it did before when you look at the amsela chart. So I had another look and there it was this big bumpy pattern and bulgy bits.
And she said, 'It's wet, macular degeneration. Good news is, we can treat this'.
And the treatment is injections into the eyeball.
(06:35):
And then the question came into my head, 'Is this something that's a few weeks away or is it going to happen now?' Before I could even ask the question, she said, 'So, we'll prepare you for your injection'.
Nice. Out came a sharpie marker. She drew a little arrow down arrow above my left eye.
And said, 'If you'd like to go and wait in the waiting room, then we'll be with you'.
(07:01):
So I sat in the waiting room and noticed that there's several other people with arrows above their eyes, which looked very, very weird.
Katie, my wife was with me, which was very kind of her because I'd originally planned to go and do this whole thing on my own by arriving on the train, but I'm glad I didn't.
So I sat there in the waiting room beginning to feel a bit sick and panicky, thought of a needle going into my eyeball, and yeah, it was just this fear.
(07:34):
But at the same time, thinking, well, there's nothing I can do about this. And they will need to do something to help me.
So, into the room you go, and this is going to sound awful because the people in there were amazing, but the image that came to my mind when I walked into this room and saw a chair,
was you know when they show you news bulletins of countries that have been liberated and they uncover these horrible prisons with torture areas, it looked like a room from that.
(08:04):
You know, like a chair in the middle of the room, I bet now when I go back next time, it'll be really nice and there'll be pictures on the walls and things, but in my mind's eye, that's all I can see this mechanical chair, not even as luxurious as a dentist's chair, you know, where they've got buttons to press and things happen automatically.
And they're made of nice leatherette.
This seems, I think it had a mechanical handle, but I might be making this up.
(08:28):
So, you sit in the chair and this very, very nice professional said, "Are you okay?" I said, "Can I be honest with you? I'm really, really nervous about this."
And she said, "Okay, I get you." She said, "And they introduced themselves." There was her, the person who was going to do the injection and an assistant, "I forget their names now, which makes me feel awful, but I wasn't really paying attention to that."
(08:53):
And she said, "Okay, so where do you live?" I said, "Straud." And then, very cleverly, she started saying, "Oh, Straud, I've always wanted to visit Straud. Tell me what I should do when I go there."
Meanwhile, she was getting everything ready and the assistant was getting everything ready and I was banging on about Straud and saying, "How nice it is and what she could do." And then she said, "Right, here we go.
(09:16):
So, would you like me to take you through exactly what I'm going to do?" And I said, "Yes, actually, I would." I felt like knowledge is power.
So then she explained that they were going to put some anaesthetic drops in my eye and she said, "Because you're nervous, we're going to give you some extras, just to be kind."
(09:37):
And the lady behind me was lovely. She said, "Is I going to look after you, sir?"
And then the lady was doing the injection and then said, "We're going to put a plastic cup on the eyeball."
It looks like a suction cup. She said, "That will stop you from blinking or if you do try and blink, it will blink into the cup rather than the needle."
(10:00):
I guess is the reason for that.
She said, "In the side of this little cup, there's a hole. That's where the needle will go. It'll be very quick. It's very sharp.
You shouldn't feel anything, you might feel some pressure. Normally, when you get injections, they always say to you don't they, they always say, "You'll feel a sharp scratch."
But she did say to me, "You won't feel a sharp scratch."
(10:22):
But whenever I've had an injection, it never feels like a sharp scratch. I don't know why they use that as a description of injections, because it just feels like a painful prick.
You don't like a... I'll do it anyway. So then they put the suction cup on, which makes everything go a bit fuzzy.
And then she said, "Look at my finger and held her finger up to the right of my vision so I was looking that way."
(10:51):
Before I know it, she said, "Here we go. The needle was coming in and she said, "Breathe deeply. That'll help."
And then I felt this pressure. It's a little prick, but it wasn't a painful prick. It was like a little pressure prickly thing and I went, "Oh, are you okay?"
I said, "Yeah, she said it's done. It's done."
So then I was... Oh, before they do all this stuff, by the way, they spread loads of iodine over your eye to stop infection.
(11:21):
So they wipe it all over. So you probably look like you've got a black eye. I didn't get a mirror held up to look.
And then afterwards they wipe that away. They get the sharpie mark off your head and they tell you to be really careful about splashing water in your eye.
You don't want to get an infection where this little hole has been made in your eyeball.
(11:42):
So they're very, very careful about warning you not to have showers and get water in your eye, get a swim and all those kinds of things.
So that all made sense.
And then once they've wiped all this iodine off, which reminded me of all creatures growing small because
James Herat and Seekfried Farman always used to talk about iodine in the surgery. James simply had some more iodine, James, for the surgery.
(12:09):
James has a lack of iodine, James, and he'd say, "Oh, my God, that's my, I'm a little bit hard of an impression, but the iodine is then wiped off."
And then you set free.
And you can't see a thing because your pupil's been dilated. You've got anaesthetic drops in your eye. Everything looks really bright and you'll need somebody to be with you to...
(12:33):
Well, you can't drive.
Next time I'm going to try and go on my own, because I will be able to see where I'm going in terms of walking with the other eye, but it just feels weird.
That's when the nausea kicked in. That's when I thought, "Oh, my God, I've just had a needle shoved in my eyeball."
What the heck? That was horrible. And I went home and I went to bed and I fell asleep and then I woke up with really wet, weepy eye.
(13:01):
And when the anaesthetic wears off, it feels like a piece of grit isn't your eyeball.
Okay, so you feel sorry for yourself a little bit afterwards. I did anyway, because I'm pathetic.
Next day I went to see a friend, I got on the train and I started thinking about this whole thing, thinking, "Did that really happen? Did somebody shove a needle in my eye and inject a drug into my eyeball?"
(13:27):
And I gradually came to terms with it and sort of made peace with it.
And I listened to a very good podcast by the Macular Society about this whole process, listened to some relaxation podcasts about dealing with surgical procedures, lots of information about breathing and thinking about beautiful places.
(13:51):
And I now feel, I mean, I've got another one in a week or so's time, and I now feel that I've made a bit of peace with this whole thing.
Now that I've been through it, now that I've got this done, I feel like I'm okay with the next one.
That's how I feel at the moment, I don't know whether I'm going to be a jibbering wreck when I go in for the next one.
(14:14):
And I did talk to my neighbour, Julian, who said, "He said all my father-in-law had those injections in his 70s and they had to hold him down on the chair because he was screaming like a baby."
And I thought, "Well, at least I didn't do that. At least I just gave her a nice description of how beautiful Stroud is."
So I feel like I'm on track. And the whole idea of this podcast, I suppose, is to keep you in touch with what's happening.
(14:42):
I'm going to say, and for you, if you're going through this yourself, I want to talk to some experts about wet, macular degeneration, dry, macular degeneration as well.
I want to just get the lowdown on all of this and find out more about what might happen in the future, whether or not these injections will save my eyesight for the time being, whether I'm ready to prepare for blindness eventually.
(15:11):
I mean, is that going to be the outcome? Or will I just lose my central vision? I've done quite a bit of reading up on this.
So I'd like to talk about people that might help you get through some of these treatments, some of the experts, people who've survived this and are living with it, positive stories, stories of people who are frightened, people who live with sight loss, I think that would be interesting as well.
(15:37):
So that's the idea of this podcast from a degenerate point of view, that's me, finding out more about macular degeneration and what it means.
I'm doing a course at the moment in learning to be an instructional designer, so it's given me a project to work on a course for beginners in macular degeneration.
(15:59):
So I'm building myself a course all about the subject, which is helping me, it's empowering me with information. So I'd love to hear your thoughts.
I'd love you to leave me a message or whatever you do with podcasts, a like or I don't flip it, no, but you know, it's the first one I've done.
This is something I want to, I want to continue into the future, so I'm hoping that you can join me on this journey. I will let you know how I get on with the next injection, which is coming up very soon.
(16:32):
I was told that with three injections, I might start to see a difference.
I've known the macular society help line yesterday and they said 50% of people might see an improvement after the third injection.
It's not always the case, it might just halt progression from here on in. I haven't found going to work easy. My employer has been brilliant, they've given me a phased return.
(17:01):
So I'm doing four hours a day this week trying to get used to using a computer screen. It is very tiring and all the stuff that I love doing is on the computer, whether it's design work, audio editing.
So I'm live without using screens is a scary one, but I'm sure there are ways that I can adapt.
This whole journey is a place I'll be going with you, hopefully on this podcast, macular degenerates. Thank you for listening. I'd love to hear your comments, I'd love to hear your questions.
(17:32):
Ideas for guests as well. People that I can speak to in the coming weeks would be really interesting.
Who should I talk to? What can we achieve through this discussion? A lot of the podcasts I've listened to are very serious.
That's good because it's a serious subject, but I'd like to think that we can have a bit of fun on the way too.
(17:54):
So we might go into some of these stories at some stage. I want to talk to some people who have good humor about this whole subject.
Because let's face it, you know, there are people who are much worse off.
I know there are. I just think, you know what? This is okay at the moment. This is something I can...
I'm going to be able to deal with with the help and support of friends, with you listening, with being able to talk about it to share it is really important.
(18:22):
Thank you for listening. See you again in the next episode of macular degenerate. I'm Chris Baxter.
[Music]
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