You are only considered legally blind if your vision cannot be improved to be better than 20/200 with corrective lenses (glasses or contacts). So, if you are -8.50 and -9.00, but you wear glasses and can see with them at least 20/200, then no, you are not legally blind. (Well, unless you have other visual impairments such as glaucoma, or macular degeneration.) But based solely on your prescription, no.

I’m also only 14 btw if that changes anything

No, you are only ‘legally blind’ if your corrected vision is 20/200 or worse (i.e. while wearing corrective lenses).

Hi David
I’m 67. I got my glasses in grade four, when I suddenly couldn’t see the blackboard from the back of the room. I *think* I started around -4 in each eye, and progressed to around -6 by my mid 20s, and have stayed there since.. At the other end, I need to remove my glasses to thread a needle.
Over the years I have dabbled with Bates to no avail. I did notice, about 10 years ago, that blurring seems to be a matter of choice. While staring at the moon, I could, with concentration, resolve 4 or 5 *sharp* images that clustered and shifted around, so I decided that I might be able to reduce the number of images, and bring them closer together. I discussed this with an ophthalmologist whom I knew socially, and I think he thought me balmy..
Flash forward.. in my semi-retired state, I do some work occasionally, finding myself in shopping plaza parking lots, waiting to be picked up. So I started trying to read signs – road signs, shopping signs, license plates, whatever, mixed with internet on my cell phone. Back and forth, far and near, just like Bates’ beads. The improvement has been shocking. What I now realize, which explains the multiple images and astigmatism, is that, my eye isn’t too long to get focused images, the muscles just need better coordination, and finer movement.
Last week I went to a movie and watched most of it without my glasses. I found your *conversion chart* and realize that I’m somewhere between -1 and -2.
[Shakes head] Fifty-eight stinkin’ years. Why now? Who knows.
LoL.
Hope you are keeping well. Thank you for this informative site.

I believe you mean zenni

Yes, anything is possible. Just learn some of the techniques like palming and sunning, really learn to relax drop your shoulders, and make it a habit, do some every day. There are plenty of books, this website, and programs out there. You may have to try one or more things, but stay with it, keep working your way up the hill so to speak.

I have -9 I recommend zeni optical. Zeni.com

Thank you, David. Very helpful article. Ann Marie, I faced your exact situation. So some months before I was due to take the test, I started trying to focus across the room at the LED time clock numbers display on the cable TV box, one eye at a time, without glasses on. I tried to make the numbers not look blurry, tilting my head or this way and that and squinting my eyes various ways. I did that a few times most days that I sat in my TV-watching chair. Gradually the numbers became less blurry. I also sometimes took grocery-store-grade eye supplements that contain things like bilberry or lutein. After a few months I found out that I could take my drivers’ eye test at a drugstore pharmacy nearby where I felt comfortable. I did that, and passed the test easily

The main point of this post is that there is no such conversion because you’re comparing two things that are only loosely related.

Yes, that is “really that bad of eyesight.”

Of all the people you see in public who are wearing glasses, fewer than 4% have such poor vision.

That’s considered pretty high, but I have heard of others in that range.