Fiona’s Story

I and my family appear to have a coping mechanism that involves a strange, slightly morbid sense of humour which led to a slightly surreal conversation with my lovely nurse specialist around how many parrot or pirate related gifts I would get for Christmas! I was also made aware, via the team at Sheffield, of Ocular Melanoma UK and the afternoon after my diagnosis I reached out to the charity, became a member and joined the patient support group online. 

My eye was removed in November 2024, and in January 2025 I received my first, temporary, prosthetic eye and had the mould made to create my permanent prosthetic. 

Even now writing that last paragraph feels a little surreal. Whilst waiting for the diagnosis I had several moments of panic and fear, but once I had a treatment plan and knew that I didn’t have any decisions to make about treatment options I kicked into planning mode. I reached out to others in the OMUK patient group to get a sense of what to expect in the days and weeks after my operation and simultaneously reached out to another online group to get some fabric off cuts from my favourite dresses to make eye patches. Afterall, if I’m going to have to wear an eye patch then I might as well look good doing so!

Alongside the amazing support from my family and other OM patients online, I also had a wonderful team of people around me through work and church. I have a close group of people at work, including my manager, who became my own personal cheer squad. They laughingly referred to themselves as my ‘back-up dancers’ and were always around with a hug, chocolate or distraction when needed. I also have some lovely 

friends from my church who prayed with and for me. Without the love, support and care from all these people I imagine that my outlook on life would be very different. 

Eighteen months after my blurry eye I was signed off from the team at Sheffield and on-going surveillance is now managed by my GP. Whilst I am currently cancer free (or have No Evidence of Disease – NED) having had my eye removed, Ocular Melanoma is unfortunately a cancer that can and does metastasize so I will need regular on-going scans to check. My GP has been good at ensuring that these scans take place as required, and the local ophthalmology team are also checking my eye and socket regularly alongside more standard optician appointments. My other regular check is with the National Artificial Eye Service, and they too have been amazing. 

I’m now, fortunately, back doing most of the things I did before this diagnosis, including driving and craft activities. I have however needed to adapt to monocular vision, which means adapting to having no depth perception. The only way I can demonstrate how this impacts me is to encourage you to use an eye patch for a day and go about your usual activities – it really is trickier than you might imagine! What should be a relatively simply task, like walking down the stairs become more challenging, and my new personal bugbear is places that have multiple different flooring types. I can see that there’s a change in the flooring but can’t tell if it’s also hiding a change in height!