Stay with me on this, it's a bit complicated. Or if you don't want the medical history, skip to the "=====================" line below.
I grew up right eye dominant, and used right eye to shoot handgun and rifle. I am right handed too. Never shot much handgun except for qualifications and occasional training while in the USAF. I had 20/20 in both eyes, pilot qualified and all that.
When I was in my late twenties, I experienced an injury to the cornea of my right eye (corneal tear). It healed quickly and well, but left me with irregular astigmatism etc. and about 20/100+ on the eye chart. I went hunting a few more times using a scope, but eventually gave up rifle, and of course iron sights were worthless.
Some twenty years later, I took up pistol and revolver shooting once again and involved myself in a defensive combat league. I did this by unlearning old habits and learning to shoot with my left eye (but still right handed). That is now my well ingrained habit of over five years.
After restarting shooting regularly, I had refractive eye surgery (PRK) of the right eye only. Reduced the astigmatism greatly but, of course, could not repair all of the surface irregularity from the healing of the corneal tear. I now see about 20/30 with my right eye, and the doc set the focus for "monovision" (reading distance) so I could read a menu or whatever without reading glasses. That is to say, my right eye (which had been relatively useless for many years) is set for reading and my left eye -- still the good eye I was born with -- has become the distance vision eye as I lose my ability to see close without glasses, just like all of us at this age. I have continued to shoot handguns sighting with my left eye (I still don't shoot much rifle).
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NET: My left eye is perfect 20/20 at distance vision, has never had any PRK surgery. My right eye is now a pretty good 20/30 vision with a reading/computer focal distance. So I don't use prescription glasses when I shoot, which seems a good thing should I ever need to quickly use a gun in self-defense. My well-ingrained habit is to shoot handguns with my left eye, closing my right eye.
I'm in my early fifties and have recently realized that I can no longer bring the front sight into focus with my left eye. I was surprised to learn that I see the front sight quite excellently with my right eye. But my habit has long since changed and I "instinctually" sight handguns with my left eye.
So my question for trainers who have helped people change their sighting eye, or for optometrist/opthamologist shooters, is: should I consider a training regimen to, once again, RE-retrain my sighting eye, this time from left back to the right eye that was dominant when I was a kid?
It seems that might give me an advantage of focusing on the front sight, as many instructors and books tell one to do. Whadayathink?
I grew up right eye dominant, and used right eye to shoot handgun and rifle. I am right handed too. Never shot much handgun except for qualifications and occasional training while in the USAF. I had 20/20 in both eyes, pilot qualified and all that.
When I was in my late twenties, I experienced an injury to the cornea of my right eye (corneal tear). It healed quickly and well, but left me with irregular astigmatism etc. and about 20/100+ on the eye chart. I went hunting a few more times using a scope, but eventually gave up rifle, and of course iron sights were worthless.
Some twenty years later, I took up pistol and revolver shooting once again and involved myself in a defensive combat league. I did this by unlearning old habits and learning to shoot with my left eye (but still right handed). That is now my well ingrained habit of over five years.
After restarting shooting regularly, I had refractive eye surgery (PRK) of the right eye only. Reduced the astigmatism greatly but, of course, could not repair all of the surface irregularity from the healing of the corneal tear. I now see about 20/30 with my right eye, and the doc set the focus for "monovision" (reading distance) so I could read a menu or whatever without reading glasses. That is to say, my right eye (which had been relatively useless for many years) is set for reading and my left eye -- still the good eye I was born with -- has become the distance vision eye as I lose my ability to see close without glasses, just like all of us at this age. I have continued to shoot handguns sighting with my left eye (I still don't shoot much rifle).
=============================================
NET: My left eye is perfect 20/20 at distance vision, has never had any PRK surgery. My right eye is now a pretty good 20/30 vision with a reading/computer focal distance. So I don't use prescription glasses when I shoot, which seems a good thing should I ever need to quickly use a gun in self-defense. My well-ingrained habit is to shoot handguns with my left eye, closing my right eye.
I'm in my early fifties and have recently realized that I can no longer bring the front sight into focus with my left eye. I was surprised to learn that I see the front sight quite excellently with my right eye. But my habit has long since changed and I "instinctually" sight handguns with my left eye.
So my question for trainers who have helped people change their sighting eye, or for optometrist/opthamologist shooters, is: should I consider a training regimen to, once again, RE-retrain my sighting eye, this time from left back to the right eye that was dominant when I was a kid?
It seems that might give me an advantage of focusing on the front sight, as many instructors and books tell one to do. Whadayathink?
