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Alex Lucas, 23 years old, was walking around a furniture store when everything around her suddenly became dark. At first, she thought the lights went off. But when her fiancé, Scott Turner, told her that nothing really changed, Alex became scared. Her eyesight just got lost, SWNS reports.
Alex, who worked as a beautician, went completed blind after months of the gradual decrease of her vision. When her prescription glasses failed to correct the issue, she was sent to a specialist.
Alex, who had to cancel the wedding with her fiancé, was given steroid drips and a plasma exchange but was unsuccessful. Doctors couldn’t diagnose what was happening to her.
Doctors later told her that Alex was suffering from a debilitating optic nerve damage.
Alex said, “Scott and I were about to go out and get some things for the flat. That’s when it happened. I told Scott that I couldn’t see anything. I said: ‘I can’t see! I can’t see your face’. He took me to catch a bus to go to hospital but I couldn’t see the bus even though it was right in front of me.
“I am now part-sighted so I can sort of see the world around me but it has changed so much. I described it to people by saying it is like I can see everything but through a really thick veil. I can only see people’s faces if they are really close to me. If they are across the room I can’t see them at all.
“I have to remind people that I can’t see if they are nodding or shaking their head. Colors have completely changed too. I can’t see green, it just looks like red to me. Everything is just really blurry and it has affected my whole life.”
Alex and Scott lives in Northfield, Birmingham. After cancelling their wedding plans, they decided to raise money to have her operated in Germany and restore her sight.
Alex said, “In early January last year I noticed that in my right eye my vision was going really blurry. I was sent to an optician but they became concerned that the glasses were not correcting anything so they referred me to the eye hospital.
“I had steroid drips, a lumbar puncture and a plasma exchange and had about 24 vials of blood taken. Then in May I was at work and had this incredible headache so I went home and that is when my sight went.
“The doctors have told me they don’t know what it is that has caused the nerve damage. I am still being monitored to make sure it doesn’t get worse but there is nothing else they can do. They don’t know what it is so all they can say is just carry on and live your life.”
The couple were engaged on Valentine’s Day last year. She lost her sight a couple of months later.
Alex said, “About seven months after it happened it suddenly hit me and I had a massive breakdown. I was asking myself: ‘What if I never get my sight back again?’ It’s nearly a year on and you’re still at the point where you think maybe it will come back.
“But there is massive part of you that thinks: ‘What if I’m like this for the rest of my life?’ It’s really hard to stay positive but you just have to keep going. I don’t know where I would be without Scott considering we only met four years ago. He’s like a little guide dog for me.
“When my sight went, we had just got engaged. Now the wedding plans have had to be put back. I have lost count of the number of times I have said to Scott: ‘I am so sorry, you had a fiancé and now you’ve got a dependent’. He just looks at me and says: ‘Whatever it takes’.
“I can’t fault him and I don’t know how he copes but he wants to do whatever it takes to get my sight back. He is always thinking of ways to make things easier for me.”
The couple needs around $7,000 for her operation at the Restore Vision Clinic in Berlin.
Alex said, “Scott is one of those people who won’t take no for an answer. We have been in touch with the mum of someone in Britain who had it and it worked with them. We’ve got appointments reserved, we just need to make sure we have the money so we can afford to fly and stay there and have the treatment.”
