English Vocabulary - Bad Eyesight: glasses, contacts, optometrist, eye doctor...

Hi. Where are you? I can't see anything. Help. Oh, that's better. Hello. Today, I'm going

to teach you about glasses. These are sunglasses. But what I'm going to teach you about today

is more important than sunglasses. They are glasses for bad eyesight.

So if you have bad eyesight, maybe you do this when you try to read something. Or you

look far away and you -- this, what I'm doing with my eyes, it's a verb, and it's called

"squint" or "squinting". So I -- or maybe you -- squint because you can't see something

properly. If this has happened to you, you might be a victim of bad eyesight. So you

need to go to an eye doctor. Now, a lot of doctors like to use bigger words

to make it more difficult for you to actually contact someone. So in doctor words, an eye

doctor's proper name is an "optometrist". If you speak a Latin-based language, maybe

you use the same word. "Opto" means "eye", and "tometrist" means -- I don't know, "doctor"?

I don't know. But I do know that "opto" means "eye". So an "eye doctor", in the proper form,

is "optometrist". If you have a problem with your eyes, you have to go to an eye doctor.

And they will get lots of money from you, do lots of tests, and then you get to wear

glasses. Cool. So the very, very first thing is we have two

adjectives to describe why you may have bad eyesight. These are the most common phrases

that people use. Now, because these two words end in -ed, they are adjectives. Because these

are adjectives, like every adjective in English, you have to use the verb "to be". So you cannot

say, "I nearsighted" or "I farsighted." You have to say, "I am nearsighted" or "I am farsighted."

So "nearsighted" means you cannot see things that are far away. So when you wake up in

the morning, depending on how bad your eyesight is, you can't read the alarm clock, or you

can't read the clock. If you're in a classroom and you sit at the back of the class -- I

always did that, and I was always like this, "I can't see what the teacher's written. I

need glasses. I'm not getting glasses." So if you can't see things far away, you're called

"nearsighted". Guess what? "Farsighted" is the opposite of that. So if you can't see

things really close up, you are what we call "farsighted". These are the layman's terms,

the regular terms that we would use for this kind of bad eyesight.

The doctor's terms for, first of all, "nearsighted", is "myopia". "Myopia" means exactly the same

as being "nearsighted". But "myopia" and "hyperopia" are nouns. So because these guys are nouns,

we have to use "have". So you could say, "I have myopia" or "I am nearsighted." They're

the same. Or you could say, "I have hyperopia" or "I am farsighted." Okay? Most commonly,

we would use this, "nearsighted", "farsighted". Depending on what language you speak, maybe

you use these in your language. And that's easier for you? Perfect. Do whatever's easiest.

The next thing that we have is another noun. We say, "I have an astigmatism." Repeat after

me. "I have an astigmatism." Your turn. Do it again. Okay. So "I have an astigmatism."

This means that your eyes do not focus well, and everything is blurry. It doesn't matter

if it's far away or close up, it's blurry. Things are, like, doubled. It's like you drank

a hundred beers, and you're constantly having double vision.

So if you have something wrong with your eyes, you're going to have to wear -- as a verb

-- glasses. Now, please be very, very careful. You don't wear "glass". I'm sure that would

hurt. You're going to have to wear "glasses". It's very important that you pronounce the

end of the word, so it sounds like "glasses". Maybe you are sick of glasses, and you got

contacts. The long form of "contacts" is, actually, "contact lenses". But we never say

"contact lenses". It takes too long. We just say "contacts". Now, some people -- those

crazy people out there -- can get colored contacts. So you can actually make your eyes

a different color. I've seen this. Some people even have contacts that have swirls, so their

eyes look swirly and crazy. And some people get very unnatural colored contacts, like

purple. So be careful. That blue-eyed girl that you're looking at might really have brown

eyes. Okay. The other kind of thing that you have to be

concerned about when you get older, maybe, are a kind of glasses called "bifocals". "Bi"

means "two". So "bifocals" actually have two different lenses in the glasses. A lot of

older people find that their eyesight is deteriorating -- getting worse and worse. So instead of

having to switch glasses from nearsighted, farsighted, you actually get one pair of glasses

that have two lenses. It takes a lot of getting used to if you have bifocals because, I'm

sure if you look, you get confused, and -- it's like you're drunk again. Bifocals are only

in glasses. Now, maybe you are sick to death of glasses,

and you've tried contacts. You just can't take it anymore. Every day you clean the contacts;

you put them in your eyes; they rip. I am speaking from experience. I used to have glasses.

I never wore them. Then I had contacts. So when I was younger, people said, "Ronnie,

you need glasses." But I didn't wear my glasses. I did, in fact, get contacts, and I could

see again. And I realized that people were looking at me because I'm a little strange.

But what I did is I had laser surgery. "Hallelujah! I can see!" Laser surgery is, actually, a

laser or beam -- let's go. They take your eyeball. They cut open -- "What? They cut

open your eyeball?" Oh, yeah. There's a skin that covers your -- a layer of skin that covers

your eyeball. They cut it open with a laser. They lift it up, and they shoot a laser, and

-- magic! It fixes your eye. Clearly, I am not an optometrist, and I don't

really know how to do laser surgery. But if you'd like to send me a check for $2000, I'll

do your laser surgery. Just subscribe to my YouTube channel, EnglishLessons4U. I'll get

you a sweet deal on laser surgery. I cannot guarantee the results. Laser surgery makes

one happy lady or gentleman because you do not have to wear glasses anymore.

If you have problems with your eyes -- what's your problem? What's your eye problem? Are

you nearsighted? Are you farsighted? Do you have an astigmatism? I -- I was blessed with

two. I had an astigmatism, and I was nearsighted. I couldn't see anything. I got the laser surgery.

Bam! I can see all of you right now. See you later.