I feel like an astronaut

These days I really feel like someone who might become an astronaut, at least, someone who is working hard toward that goal. OK I know I was intending this blog to be strictly scientific, but given the recent medical advances, can you allow a personal touch?

One of my childhood dream was to become an astronaut. Unlike many childhood dreams, this stuck with me. Of course I always knew that I would not become one when I grew up.
I always considered my blindness to be the real big obstacle in my way. I know, we tend to focus our attention on those things that make us feel weakest...In blaming my lack of sight so much I was overlooking, for instance, that in order to be an astronaut you usually need to be a scientist of some sort, and...I can hardly go beyond algebra without my brain going on fire! I was also overlooking the fact that astronauts have to be in perfect shape; though I am very fit, well I admit it, I can get kind of sick when I go on my swing sometimes...LOL. And last but not least, well, not all scientifically-oriented, highly motivated, healthy athletes end up in space!
Anyway, apart from these wise considerations, my blindness still did have a role in spoiling some of my life’s plans, and not just the “plan” of going on a space ship.
Now though, blindness may be bringing something exciting my way, and I’m realizing it only now that retinal research has reached the human trial stage.

What if it really happens? What if a trial for my type of LCA gets planned, approved and patients are recruited. And what if I make a good candidate for such a trial?? It now seems feasible. What will happen next?

Learning how to see, no matter how little I will be able to see, will be like embarking on a thrilling, defying exploration of a new, unknown place. I’ve never seen anything beyond light and shadows. Even if I only get to see some shapes, how will it feel? Will there be sensory overload for a while? How long will it take before I begin to figure out what my eyes are sending to my brain? How will it feel?? The fact is, nobody can answer these questions right now, because it has never been done before.

Learning how to see. Stepping out into the unknown. Experiencing new sensations. Taking a daring step toward something of which nobody knows the outcome. Doesn’t it all sound a bit like what the astronauts do?

Astronauts get to experience 0G. They get to experience incredible accelerations, then float in their space ship where up and down loses most of its meaning, as they watch the earth spin below them, in a sky full of stars. All brand new, unimaginable sensation. Well, won’t seeing a shape feel almost as strange and thrilling to me as riding a space ship might feel to them?
Astronauts bring crucial knowledge to mankind. I won’t go so far to claim that my newly acquired sight will be half as useful to the world, however it certainly will be very interesting to researchers, physicians, and psychologists (hopefully not psychiatrists!) to witness how someone blind from birth can adjust to the new sensory input.
Astronauts must have a powerful spirit of adventure. Space is the new frontier, Their adventure is exciting, fulfilling, scary. If I’m given the chance, I too will undertake a big adventure. Like all adventures, it may be dangerous, but I’m eager to take the risk. If the heroes in the Challenger and Columbia missions were prepared to sacrifice their lives, I must be at least prepared to face unplanned consequences for my health or whatever happens. Like all adventures it may fail...I must be prepared for it. Many great candidate astronauts never actually made it to lift off.

I’ve always felt I was born for great things. But as I realized that I had no special talents and was just an ordinary girl, I simply began to ignore that thought. Now there may be a defying enterprise planned for me after all. And my blindness, which I always saw as my bitter enemy, may be the one thing that will allow me to come closer to space flight...

OK I know, it’s not the same! Being an astronaut is much better than being an eye patient... OK, I would still so much prefer to be born sighted and spare myself all the trouble. But unless I was born with a more developed scientific brain :-) along with good sight, I still would not become an astronaut...Therefore, as is wise, I try to ignore the bad and only keep the good.

Hopefully I’ll be “in space” in a couple of years....! And then, at least, I might be able to watch the stars. Being an astronomer is another of my childhood dreams that stuck, but....OK, now back to strictly scientific matters...

Thanks for reading me blabber.

Fran – Italy, 36, LCA CEP290 gene