Drops drops and drugs.... a speculum kept my eye lid open, a patch on the idle eye. I stared a blinking red light while they brushed, sponged, lasered, watered, and lensed my poor, defenseless eye.
The difference between getting LASIK and PRK is that LASIK requires less recovery time and a flap is cut on the surface of the eye which heals faster. In PRK, they use a brush (picture a Sonicbrush, you know, the toothbrush) to scrape away and make the distance of light from the back of my retina to the cornea shorter. Then after that abrasion, its to heal over time, a little longer than LASIK. The Aviation Navy grounds me for a minimum of 3 months as opposed to 2 weeks in LASIK. However, I couldn't get LASIK because it still isn't approved for aviators due to the lack of research study for its effect on visual acuity. So.. PRK it was.
As painless as this procedure was, I am still waiting for the worst to come. I wasn't sensitive to light right away coming out of the laser suite, but as the numbing drops and Percocet faded, I felt more and more the stinging pain on my eyes. Fantastic. They give me 4 days until they take the shielding contact lenses. I only hope I can survive until then. I have to say its been pretty cool having a caregiver watch over me and drive me when I'm drugged. It was such a beautiful day too, and the sun turned into an enemy :( I like this not wearing glasses thing... I just can't wait to be off of the eye drops. I absolutely hate taking medicine.
I have to be pretty ridiculous to be on here looking at a screen, but good thing I don't need my eyes to type now don't I? It's ok, because... "I wear my sunglasses at night so I can so I can..."
**edit**
2 Days after the surgery... I forgot the initial reason I had named this blog Surgery Season was because this entire week, my grandfather had just had a heart attack that required a triple bypass surgery (of which he thankfully survived) and my cousin was also up against what turned out to be a prolactinoma -- benign tumor in the pituitary gland, again, thankfully she didn't have to undergo surgery.
As for me, I am bored just trying to close my eyes all day, and my body isn't made for sleeping all the time EVEN WITH narcotic drugs... I'd much rather be awake doing something. I lie awake in the wee hours of the morning wishing it was already breakfast time. My roommate left for the weekend to enjoy Seattle and the Patriots-Seahawks game as well, of that I'm a bit jealous having to sit around and do practically nothing. My friend Rebecca was cool enough to remember my love for fried chicken and she brought over a bucket of KFC to enjoy with me before I would drug again and go to sleep.
Tonight I'm headed back across the ferry with my caregiver Shannan... we are going to stay in Bremerton, WA tonight to make sure I get to my post-op appointment on time. They will hopefully then remove the bandage contact lens from my eyes and I can work on healing the corneal abrasion merely by blinking a lot. It will be a step back as far as vision goes for a day, but then hopefully I'll be back to driving/cooking/living mode soon after.
Gotta love modern technology, eh?
nice of you to drop by. this was actually the first photo i took with the new camera you guys sent me - thanks. must admit that i am not the best at taking pictures though - my hands tend to get a little shaky.
ReplyDeletenice blog by the way (love the picture at the header)- only wish i could write as good as you. thanks also for the prowler, i am already working on it but i am taking my time so it will probably take me weeks to finish it.
thanks also for taking care of my mom while she was there.