A woman was shockingly left blind after performing an innocent trick at the beach.
Deborah Cobb was just 19 years old when a day of fun at the beach turned to a disastrous months-long ordeal.
The Seattle woman, now 42, revealed she went blind, unable to drive, read, or watch TV, which doctors initially shrugged off as a consequence of sunburn.
However, it later transpired Cobb has actually damaged both of her eyes after doing a pretty normal acrobatic move for a bit of fun with her buddies.
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Cobb said she decided to show off how many cartwheels she could do in a row on the summer's day, but after completing 13, she recalled feeling 'super dizzy.'
The then teen realized something was wrong with her eyesight, even though there was no pain.
"I decided to see how many cartwheels I could do in a row just for fun," Cobb recalled to Newsweek recently, "So I started doing them and got to 13 and fell over super dizzy. My eyes were kind of spinning so it took a moment to realize that my eyes weren't focusing."
Looking at her friend after the trick, Cobb said she just a 'giant orange blur,' adding: "My eyes wouldn't fully focus.
"There was no pain, and my peripheral vision was fine, but everything I looked directly at was blocked by an orange blur.
"I was panicking inside, but not outwardly so my friends didn't think anything of it," she continued.
While she tried to act cool for the rest of the day with her pals, the following day, her vision had gotten worse and she decided to go to hospital.
"My central vision was completely gone... I couldn't drive, I couldn't read, I couldn't see myself in the mirror... which meant I couldn't put on makeup... I couldn't even watch TV," Cobb, who nows works as an integrative health practitioner and nervous system regulation coach, said.
Medics initially considered she had simply 'sunburned' her retinas, but a retinal specialist uncovered a far more serious diagnosis.
"I had hemorrhaged in both of my maculas and it was going to take three to six months to fully heal,' she said.
The condition is considered rare, and especially in someone so young.
Doctor Rajesh C. Rao, an ophthalmologist who specializes in surgery of the retina, told the outlet: "In healthy individuals, especially young people, this occurrence is quite rare.
"The head being upside down abruptly or repeatedly can also increase pressure in veins in the retina, and some at-risk individuals can be prone to macular hemorrhage."
After her shocking diagnosis, Cobb said she just 'started sobbing'.
"It was the first time it fully hit me how limited I was and how dependent I was on other people for simple things like reading—which I had completely taken for granted."
Fortunately, her vision did return within about three months, though even decades later, her injury still troubles her as she says she can suffer from flashes of light and dark floaters which only surgery can fix.
However, Cobb says she's grateful for what she has.
"We so often focus on what's going wrong in our lives, that we miss all of the things that are going right.
"There are so many simple gifts that could be bringing us joy every day, if we just learned to appreciate them. That's what this experience taught me: never stop being grateful."
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