- published: 07 May 2014
- views: 1096
Scotopic sensitivity syndrome, also known as Irlen Syndrome and Visual Stress Syndrome, approximating in some ways to Meares Irlen syndrome, and 'Visual Stress', refers to visual perceptual disorder(s) affecting primarily reading and writing based activities. Its existence is not recognized as a homogenous condition by the American Academy of Pediatrics or the American Optometric Association, although its symptomatic occurrence is accepted by the latter and has never been contested by the former (see skepticism below). It is accepted as a homogenous condition however by a respected body of international expert medical opinion, and has been studied in the former Applied Psychology Unit, Cambridge University in the UK, and the Scottish Parliament has also funded a research and treatment centre at the Glasgow Caledonian University, for the associated condition of Meares/Irlen Syndrome.
Irlen syndrome is sometimes categorised as a form of dyslexia. However, bestselling autistic author, Donna Williams, in her book Like Colour To The Blind wrote about her experience of tinted lenses (Irlen filters) after being diagnosed with scotopic sensitivity. In this book she described the lenses as enabling her to have cohesive, unfragmented vision, able to see faces, bodies and objects as a whole for the first time and reducing the extremity of experiences such as meaning-blindness, face blindness, inability to learn to read facial expression and body language and the social consequences of these impairments. This led to a worldwide raised awareness of scotopic sensitivity as a sensory perceptual problem common in many (but not all) people with autism and expanded awareness of the potential effects of Scotopic Sensitivity far beyond that of reading disability, also leading to awareness of the effects of fluorescent lighting on those with this perceptual disorder.
I was gazing deep into past shallows
You reached out
Now I can see
For so many moons I was held in a trance
Pulled trough
You showed me things in a brand new light
Selfish desire
But I was always the pupil
Bite the hand that feeds
For blood will pulp the self-importance
It's just a vision from the past
With each twist and turn of the journey
Yesterday would await
Our stubborn pride to walk alone
Is never ending spirals
And regret can be all too real
But what's done is done
And I turn my back on despair
Today my life begins
Now I'm diving into a reality of make-believe
A fantasy of a dreamer's passion fulfilled
Reflection cracked by will
You gave the push that was needed
Splintered glass, this Bedlam shattered
Shards of yesterday like rain on stone washed away
Through the looking glass, faster I fall
But my greed might just throw me back
Absurd desire won't strangle this
For this is what is meant to be
Now on reflections I look back
And I remember
I was
I was gazing deep into past shallows
You reached out
Now I can see
You possess all that I need