Yo!

So, I've got good news, bad news, and well-what-can-you-do-about-it news. It's been abot two months since I put up that AN, and things have changed slightly since then, in more than one way.

I saw my ophthalmologist a week after that AN went up, and it turns out that I don't have a cataract in my right eye yet. That is, of course, great. I still have one in my left eye though-that one's been there for nearly four years now, and won't be going anywhere anytime soon it seems. Naturally, not having a cataract in my right eye meant that there had to be some other reason my vision was deteriorating so much in that eye. Turns out I had a massive flare up, and there was so much inflammation in my eye that it was literally blinding me. So yeah, not good.

My dosage for eye drops was immediately increased to once every hour, and I was started on a couple of other drops as well to help deal with the damage the excessive inflammation was causing. The reason I thought it was a cataract was because there was no pain, and it felt exactly the same as it did when the cataract started in my left eye. Usually, I experience a lot of pain during a flare up, and there was none at all during this one, which is why I didn't even consider it. I've learned better now.

I saw my rhumatologiste about a week after that, and was told the immunosuppressant I've been on since November isn't working. I'd been on it for about five months by that point, and it should have at least started. The point of the medication is to prevent inflammation, but not only did the inflammation not go away, it actually increased an alarming amount. So I was then started on a new immunosuppressant. This one is much stronger and is known to target the eye issues I have, which makes it more likely to work. I started the new one around three weeks ago, and it'll be a few months before it starts working, if it even does. I'm still on the previous one too, and have been for six months now, because they want me to have as much of the medication in me as possible, and people are frequently treated with both at the same time.

Now, with the hourly steroid eye drops, the inflammation decreased a lot, but still isn't gone. The drops have now decreased to four times a day in my right eye, and will be staying at four until, well, who knows. With the pandemic, and me having a compromised immune system, my doctors would rather I not go outside. They're keeping contact with me on the phone and, of course, have told me to contact them immediately if something happens. But at least for the next month I'm to keep things as they are right now and not change anything.

Since the inflammation decreased somewhat, my vision in my right eye has improved a little. It's not great, and it isn't anywhere near where it was before this huge flare up. I can't read books, or anything I've previously written by hand (which sucks because I have so many fics and ideas that are hand written-including all of my notes for fourth year in The Secret Rune). I can look at screens if I increase font, display, magnification sizes and the like, but even then, I can't look at screens for too long before it starts bugging my eye. Again, even with the decreased vision, my right eye is the only one I've been able to see out of for the past three and a half years, and straining my eye is obviously not a good idea. And cataract surgery for my left eye won't be happening any time soon. I was saying summer at the earliest, but it likely won't be until winter, and most likely won't be until some time next year. But hey, if I have enough vision in one eye to get by, I'll be fine. I don't even remember what it's like being able to see out of both eyes, even if it was only a few years ago, and I haven't had depth perception in ages either. It's pretty crazy how humans are able to adapt to things so easily, huh?

I've still managed to get a bit of writing done though, even if it's been slow going. I also have chapters I'd finished writing before the huge flare up, but never got around to posting because of my mental health. I have new chapters for Boredom and Secrets, A Whispered Plea, Easy Fear, Thinking of You, Even a Saviour Needs a Knight, It Began With a Letter, and Why Wait. There's only one chapter for all of them, but hey, that's still seven new chapters. Like I said, most of these were written before the flare up, and the ones that hadn't been finished were started before, and finished now.

So here we get to the reason why I'm putting up this note. I'm not back fully, but with the way the world's kind of gone to shit, and with how many people are stuck at home and having a hard time with it, I figure people need some distracting. I've got chapters to post, and people will be happy to read them, so that's what I'm going to do. They won't be up all at once though (they're all probably on the short side too). I still have to edit them, and I can't look at screens for that long-even this note took me a couple of days to type out because of that. And once those seven updates are up, I can't say when there might be more. With these ones, they were already finished or nearly finished. The next chapters will be, well, the entire chapter that'll have to be written, and that's bound to take a while.

Thank you guys so much for all the kind words, advice, suggestions, and podcast recommendations. I guess I'm kind of jaded, because I honestly didn't really expect many people to care, so the response was shocking, to say the least. I guess I'm more used to people not really giving a damn about the person on the other side of the screen being an actual person (I've even had people complain about my AN's before, saying they don't care about the writer, only the story), and shit like that sticks with you, you know? It was really nice to see so many kind words, and I'm sorry to everyone who told me about their own physical or mental health issues. It's rough, dealing with health problems, even if you do get used to it.

Anyway, I'll start putting things up in the coming days, won't say exactly which days because I have no idea when it'll be-depends on my eyes, depression, and migraines. I wrote a short oneshot I'd like to put up on the twenty fifth, because I'd made a habit of posting little oneshots or drabbles on my birthday (though I believe I missed last year). You might see an update to something before that, or it may be after, not sure just yet, but we'll get to it, and hopefully these new chapters will distract you all from what's going on at least for a few minutes.

I hope you're all doing alright with the pandemic, and are dealing with the quarantine okay. Please stay inside. Maybe you think you're healthy enough to not get sick, but you can't say the same for everyone around you. I look perfectly healthy, but have a compromised immune system-we don't know how I'd react if I got sick, and the same can go for people around you. It may be hard, but just stay inside and hopefully things will be able to go back to normal sooner rather than later.

Tl;dr: No cataract. Huge flare up. Excessive inflammation being treated. Vision improved enough to get a bit of writing done with some screen aids. Will be updating a few fics in the coming days since the world's gone to shit and people need distracting. Thank you for the kind words, really appreciate it. Please stay inside and don't be an idiot.

Laterz!