Peripheral Vision

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Does anyone else have extreme tunnel vision?

No way. I have vision like a horse: I can see things right on my side with clarity comparable to that of forward-facing vision.

Not extreme - but enough to make it a tad difficult and be made fun of for getting constantly startled. I also have visual snow and have had a few episodes of cortical blindness. Too many vision issues to list. When I was three it was discovered I saw everything backwards. Until sixth grade I still wrote some letters backwards - before that you had to look in a mirror to read what I wrote.

Vision is not my friend and it is only this last year did I realize my field of vision was not how everyone else sees.

I had some sort of episodes of something like this as a child.

Not extreme tunnel vision, but when I'm walking along I don't spot people who I know, I tend to rush straught past them without noticing them, so they have to call me. I don't have faceblindness though, it's just that I don't really look at people straight in the face because I don't like meeting other people's eyes (unless I am in an environment where I know everybody, like at work, then eye contact is completely natural and I don't miss anybody when I walk past them).

Most people seem to spot people they know. I think they just observe the people around them without realising they're doing it, sort of like a natural instinct. Because I'm socially anxious when out in public places, I tend to not look at anyone I don't know, and if I was to observe the people around me, it isn't natural, so I look more nervous and jumpy if I meet someone's eye because if someone happens to look at me I immediately think they are delibrately looking at me to judge - even though rationally I know that isn't (or shouldn't be) true, being so I have just wrote why people look at one another a few lines above!

Some sort of video or picture reference would be good - i wear glasses so my vision is limited to the front anyway so its hard to tell.

I seem to have very good peripheral vision. I can make out the larger details of objects that are roughly 80 degrees to the side of when my eyes are looking straight forward. I don't know what the average is, so I don't really know how "good" my peripheral vision is.

Is tunnel vision the opposite of peripheral vision?

I actually have fantastic peripheral vision, and I use it frequently. It is so strong that I can people and things that are technically behind me on either side.

it kind of is, indeed.
with tunnel vision, you can only see what is directly in your line of sight, as if looking trough binoculars

my periferal is strong too; i can read books with it, and frequently do becouse i have to strain myself to use my focal vision.

actually, i recently found out why i'm bad at catching things; i dont actually use my focal vision at all, unless i actively "turn it on", the field of vision that should be seen with my left eyes focus is actually seen with my right eyes close periferal, and vice-versa.
this not only hinders my depthperception, but also triggers using the wrong hand (if it's on my left side, i see it with right, so i try my right hand first)

I'm 43 and just recently was diagnosed as High functioning. I am still learning how to manage myself better. A severe burnout lead me to therapy and I had to relearn some coping mechanisms I started using as a kid that helped me mask. A few weeks ago something new happened and I think it was the physical version of tunnel vision. I was in the hospital for a food bolus in the bottom third part of my esophagus. My mother and close friend were both with me the entire way until the GI team came in with their equipment. In a matter of seconds the entire room changed as some various equipment was carted in and the nurse that I started with was replaced with the doctors and nurses from the GI team. As soon as a new nurse came in and started talking to me I lost my peripheral vision. I basically had to manually think through the situation and figure out what she was saying to me and put her words into context with the environment I was in.

I don't seem to have tunnel vision, in fact anything moving in the peripheral field tends to distract me from looking at the centre. For example, if I'm watching a video and somebody is sitting next to me stroking a cat in their lap, I can't screen it out, and I have to shut one eye to block the distraction.

I have tunnel vision due to my derealization. I'm not sure if anyone is able to relate but around the time I turned 17, I entered a chronic episode of derealization that I haven't been able to shake off.

Right there with you. I find that seeing things around me isn’t concentrated at all, it’s just observing what’s there. In my harshest times of derealization, it was like I was trying so hard to see that I couldn’t see anything

Yea this is what it feels like. Blocks of text, except for the word I'm looking at exactly, is just a blur. It is a really bizarre experience.

There is definitely something subconscious going on as to why I'm experiencing life this way, but I've never really figured it out.

I totally understand that confusion. I’ve come to see it as a kind of paradox because the problem dissolves when you’re not trying to fix it. It’s like a mechanism that creates itself. That’s just a short way of explaining something that can be deeper subconsciously though because it’s not like you’re trying to do it. When my brain is still and not a pinball machine (I’m not fighting it) in this natural state of acceptance the vision problem doesn’t happen to me.

It’s just that you don’t willfully bring acceptance, otherwise it’s another exertion of force, resistance. It’s like watching yourself without feeling “I must change myself”