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| Home > Healthy People > December 2001 |
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January - March, 2002 |
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Striking Vision
Laser vision correction surgery gives
Miss Missouri a new outlook
Miss Missouri Jennifer Hover has always been a "girly-girl" in fact, her first pair of glasses in the third grade had hot-pink frames.
"My favorite color was pink at the time. At first, I was supposed to wear my glasses to see the blackboard in class, but by fifth grade, I had to wear them all the time. I was a little self-conscious about it, so my parents let me get contacts," Hover says. "From fifth grade until last summer, I was used to waking up and having to put in my contacts in so I could walk across the room without tripping over something."
Springfield's 23-year-old Hover, who competed for the Miss America crown Sept. 22, 2001, had Lasik laser vision correction surgery at St. John's Eye Laser Center just two months before she strutted her stuff at the pageant in Atlantic City, N.J.
Lasik is a method of reshaping the clear outer window of the eye, called the cornea, to help the eye focus properly and reduce the need for contact lenses and glasses. The eye surgeon creates a corneal flap and moves it to one side. An excimer laser then removes a predetermined number of microscopic layers of the cornea. The surgeon then moves the corneal flap back. Lasik can treat nearsightedness and farsightedness, with or without astigmatism.
Before her surgery, Hover was nearsighted and considered legally blind without her contacts.
"When I was 16, I went to get my driver's license with only one contact in because I had torn the other one and didn't have an extra. They wouldn't give me my license because they discovered I was legally blind in the eye without the contact and that was my good eye! It's still really strange for me to go a whole day and not even think about my eyesight. It's something most people really take for granted," Hover says.
Hover's procedure, performed by St. John's ophthalmologist Craig Peterson, M.D., was "a little uncomfortable, but not painful," Hover says. "I could tell a huge difference right away, and I'm seeing perfectly now."
Peterson said Hover's improvement is typical of that of most Lasik patients.
"Jennifer had a significant amount of nearsightedness, which limited her vision to about 20/400, but her eyesight was well within the range to safely correct with laser. The day after the procedure, her vision had improved enough to where she could drive without contacts or glasses, and she now has 20/20 vision," Peterson said.
Hover, a University of Tulsa graduate, is fulfilling her Miss Missouri duties before starting graduate school at the University of Oklahoma and marrying
fiance` Brad White in August. Her typical week consists of traveling the state for speaking engagements and appearances.
"No week is typical when you're Miss Missouri, but I'm usually driving around to schools speaking to children, and depending on the age, I talk to them about things from tattling versus responsible reporting to positive peer pressure and self-esteem issues. I do a workshop called
'Peer Power' and I play a game with teenagers called 'Take a Stand,' and we talk about avoiding drugs and alcohol," Hover says. "I also do fun things like ribbon cuttings last fall I appeared at the ribbon cutting for the Wonders of Wildlife museum in Springfield. One of my favorite appearances so far was a celebrity barbecue in Kansas City, where I got to meet some of the Kansas City Chiefs football players, and I left with a cooler full of meat. I'd have to say that was one of the more unusual gifts I've received so far as Miss Missouri."
Hover, the second-oldest of Dr. Alex and Barbara Hover's five children, got her start in pageants at age 18 when she won the Miss Springfield crown wearing her sister's prom dress and her mother's heels. She competed in the Miss Missouri pageant five years in a row before she won in 2001. Her victory in the state pageant propelled her to compete for the Miss America crown, which was awarded to Miss Oregon, Katie Harman.
"I made the top 20 and I was really excited. My heart sunk, just for a moment, when I didn't hear my name for the top 10. Then I looked out at the audience, and pictured 12,000 women out there cheering for me, and instantly felt better because I realized that I had made the top 20 out of 12,000 women who had wanted to be where I was," Hover says. "There's no words to describe the feeling I had out on that stage at that moment, and I suddenly realized how much I had gone through to get there."
Hover says the 51 Miss America contestants became a family because of the unique circumstances of the 2001 pageant they arrived in Atlantic City for rehearsals the day before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.
"It was surreal. When it all happened, we were over at the convention hall and it was against the rules to have a cell phone, radio or television because the media have the list of finalists before any of the contestants know how they placed. A police officer walked through the convention hall mumbling something about a plane crashing into one of the towers of the World Trade Center. Miss Wisconsin had snuck in a radio and we listened as the second plane hit, and we couldn't believe it. We thought we were listening to something like the 'War of the Worlds,'" Hover says. "We instantly bonded; we comforted each other because we were all thousands of miles away from our families. It was one of the most amazing experiences of my life 51 delegates from every state and Washington, D.C., joined hands to pray several times a day for our country every day during the course of the rehearsals and pageant."
Hover says those who criticized pageant officials for continuing with the show in the wake of the attacks would have felt differently if they could have seen what went on behind the scenes.
"If the critics could see what went on behind the scenes, they would understand that the Miss America pageant is a celebration of American spirit," Hover says. "That's why we continued with the program. The officials came to us and asked all the contestants to take a vote as to whether we should go on with the pageant. We all agreed that it was a wonderful opportunity to show patriotism and lift spirits, much like a USO show, and we thought not going on would be a sign of weakness and giving in to what the terrorists most wanted, which was to disrupt our way of life."
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