Eye Sight and Aging

I am aware that I am getting old. I am proud of my achievements so I don't necessarily mind that my body is beginning to show signs of aging and to be honest I think I'm wearing pretty well. I have seen those extreme make-over programmes where women take off all their clothes and reveal swathes of extra skin hanging around where skin shouldn't normally be and then require a plastic surgery procedure to tighten it all back up. All very horrific but actually making me feel better about my own carcass.

I am in the habit of buying lotions and potions for my sagging neck and crows feet and I am addressing the issue of muscle tone and decreasing bone mass at a twice weekly exercise class. This is all pro active anti aging stuff to preserve me.

The one thing that I didn't really expect was failing eye sight. There are no lotions or potions for not being able to see to read. It all started about 4 years ago when I reluctantly succumbed to a pair of reading glasses for home use only which were intended for reading privately and never to be brought out in a public place. God forbid. After a few months I was forced to use them at work and that involved carrying them around just in case I needed to read something. They would definitely not be on face as a general rule because that would be like giving in to being old.

I have to admit that for a while I took to using one of those chains you loop the arms through and so they hang like a necklace. They are easy to find and it does stop them getting so damaged. However I began to feel like Miss Jean Brodie and very school ma'am so I ceased that technique and moved over to the more sexy 'keeping them in the neckline of the blouse' method. This was OK for a bit although the disadvantage of that is they fall out every time you bend over. I just carry them around in a case these days.

So I had to fess up to being a wearer of glasses at work and at home. Then came the problem of finding them. Were they at work or were they at home? The constant searching became tiresome so I purchased an extra pair.

An ever declining scenario of deterioration. All such actions meaning that my eye sight, due to old age was failing.

One of the biggest decisions was restaurant use. For ages I just would not take them out with me but after a few meals where I just couldn't read the menu at all and had to rely on husband to order for me I had to come to terms with the fact that without my reading glasses I couldn't peruse a menu and for me which is essential to the great enjoyment that is eating out. Nowadays my reading glasses (and I have 3 pairs) are in my handbag at all times and are taken out and put on for all sorts of different reasons; reading price tags in shops, texting, looking at my ipod menu (why does that have to be SO small?), reading notes from kids, reading my ridiculously small lap top screen. Without glasses I am disadvantaged.

But the most awkward situation is bathroom use. I have not really solved the problem of needing glasses in the shower. I have really badly shaved legs and armpits because I can't see if I have removed the growth or not so I just guess. I can't see if I have plucked my eyebrows accurately. I can't see if I have to re-do the gray coverage on my pigment deficient hair. And the worst and most embarrassing is I can't see to pluck the large ugly black hair that continues to grow with surprising stelth and robustness on my top lip - eek!

What do I do? Is there such a thing as bathroom glasses? Answers on a postcard please...