20/20-- after only a week!

 I went in to the doctor again today.  He said my eyes looked fine and he took out the contacts.  I also tested at 20/20 in my right eye and 20/25 in my left.  Wow, it improved that much in just 2 days?  Nice. 

Things are still bright.  I've managed to not really have to take eye-breaks from the computer by wearing sunglasses all the time still.  I haven't driven yet.  So.... I wonder when I'll be ready to do that?  I'm down to just one eye-drop 4x a day and then I will gradually taper off of that.

I can't wait to:  drive, exercise, wear eye makeup, be able to swim

nothing, but eyes

 Not much else is really going on in life right now.

I went to the doctor this morning expecting to get the contacts out, but to no avail!  I'm going back on Wednesday.

I did test at 20/25 right eye and 20/30 left.  Not too bad!  

eyes-- status update

Thursday (day 2 post surgery) started out wonderfully. I felt OK, so I popped into Turkish class and surprised everyone. Then I stopped into work (only because it was next door and I wanted to pick up Buket for lunch). Went out to lunch with Buket, got a smoothie, listened to some more of my novel on CD. I even got some flowers from my aunt, which was such a nice surprise.

I was feeling so loved and good about everything that I got cocky. "Those cry-babies on the internet," I thought, "if this is as bad as it gets, why was I so stressed?" Then right around 6pm the dreaded "3rd day" hit me. My eyes couldn't focus and stung like I had just poured a bottle of shampoo in each one. I was rendered useless. I couldn't even look in my fridge it was so bright. I sat in the dark with tears streaming out of my closed eyes. Pain medicine didn't touch it. By the time Kyohei got home, I had him fish out whatever alcohol was in the fridge. I drained 1/2 a bottle of wine, took 2 Tylenol PMs and headed to bed. I could hardly even eat.

I woke up around lunch time on Day 3 (Friday the 13th) feeling much the same. Kyohei made an eye-drop, Jimmy John's and Sam Adams run for me. A super ARIGATOU to him! If Sam Adams, Roy Orbison and this White Russian Guy can get me through heartaches, why not eye aches? I drank allllllllll day. It was like a blind, painful St. Patrick's Day, alone in my room dancing to Frank Sinatra and talking on the phone. Come to think of it, not a bad day afterall.

By 7:30pm I was feeling OKish, so I put on some clothes, tied my hair back, put my biggest blackest shades on and headed over to campus to catch the orchestra performance. I was glad I did, it was beautiful. I was too restless afterwards to just sit at home. I rendezvoused with some other friends and went dancing. It actually seemed cool at the time to have a valid excuse to wear sunglasses at night. I vaguely remember meeting a startlingly attractive Japanese man and trying to convince him to go on the 88 temple pilgrimage (wth is wrong with me?). Through the blinding pain and blinding amounts of alcohol the night still feels like a distant dream.

DAY 4: I woke up Saturday feeling hungover, but fine. Just like that the eye pain was gone! You just never know what to expect, I guess. I went and hung out at T&A's house, the art festival and went out again afterwards. I wonder if I shouldn't try to spend a night at home someday? The guy at the door of the club said, "Hey, good to see you again, you were here last night, right?" "No," I said with a wink, "Wasn't me."

Day 5: Back to work at the flowershop today. Things are still pretty bright and a little blurry from time to time, but manageable. I'm excited to get the hard contacts out tomorrow morning. Then the real healing begins!

PRK surgery

 Have eye surgery is almost like having a birthday!  I got all these calls, texts and facebook posts from friends and family, it turned out to be a very happy day.  I even earned my free smoothie for my 10th visit!

Here's my surgery story:

I got to the clinic at 9:30 feeling pretty anxious, but determined to get this over with

Another eye test, which you know I loathe, but that HOT resident administered it.  This time I got to see him with my glasses on.  Yep, still hot.

They must have been busy because I was waiting around in the exam room for like an hour.  Pictured here is what I had in my pocket for good luck.  A Shinto o-mamori and some crosses.

Finally the doctors (surgeon and hot guy) came in with the waiver.  After I signed it, I eagerly drank down my Valium (actually Diazepam, the generic) while they went over what was going to happen again. 

"Ok," I said, "so drugs, flashing lights and noise.  Let's do this!"

A nurse lead me back to another sofa beside the "laser room" to wait some more.  All the waiting was killing me.  About 20 or so minutes later when the team came around the corning in blue bonnets and all the medical trappings (this looked kinda cool like on ER or something, but more like a slow-mo money shot, circa "Swingers" Maybe the Valium had kicked in.)  The hot guy asked if I was feeling a little drunk or relaxed.  I said maybe, that I really couldn't tell.  Hell, if they wanted me to feel drunk I could have taken care of that easily enough. 

I got in the chair and laid down.  Immediately they swung this big machine right over my face and I almost had a total panic attack.  I don't like things near/on my face.  I was SO close to jumping up and saying "nevermind!" But then I imagined the $4K I just put on my credit card (ooooh the glorious frequent flyer miles I just earned) and the shame I would feel telling everyone I backed out.  So I sucked it up, squeezed on the rubber stress balls they gave me and opened my eyes. 

They had put so many anesthesia drops in by that point that I really didn't feel anything.  He taped down my upper and lower lashes and put in this plastic thing to hold my eye open.  Not the most comfortable, but not that bad.  It kind of looked like Donnie Darko where you see ripples and waves when they doctor was scraping off the epithelium of my eye.  It took a long time and I was freaking out.  I decided to just repeat the Lord's prayer over and over again in my mind.  I think that helped.  Then I had to look at the laser for 30 seconds.  I could smell it burning. Eerie.  Then they blasted my eye with some more cold water and off the tape came and he put in the protective hard contact.

"Whoh! I could have saved on getting my eyebrows waxed if I knew about this." 

They laughed and then started on the left eye.  Same thing.  I asked if I was the longest epithelial removal he's ever had.  He said no.  "Darn," I said, "I wanted to be the best or most of something."  When the left was done, he told me that I won the award for best focus of pretty much all his other patients.  "You really didn't move your eye at all," he said. 

"Wow, that's the first time I ever got best for my focus!"  (I can be a little all over the place)

I jumped out of the chair and was amazed at how well I could see already.  Now that the stress was gone and I could see, I felt pretty euphoric.  I think the Valium was really kicking in then.  I went to another room and started texting. 

"So you can see well enough to text??  That's good..." the doctor and the hot doctor came in to give me post-op instructions and a little kit with goggles for sleeping, sunglasses and all kinds of eye drops.  I kept giggling when he went over everything.  In my valium-addled mind, the drops were hilarious.

Me, post PRK, feeling like an amped-up beast who just survived something

Below:  my awesome shades, goggles and eye drops

2 of these are 4 times a day, one is twice and the other is whenever I feel like my eyes are dry

I pretty much slept all day

and listened to "The Pillars of the Earth" novel on CD

I went in for a follow-up this morning and everything is looking good.  The doctor said that my epithelium is healing really, really quickly.  Awesome.  Fast-healing is, of course, my super power.  That means, that my eyes should definitely be healed enough to get the protective contacts out by Monday.  This is great because they are super irritating.  My eyes pretty much feel like I have both contacts in inside-out.  Not cool. 

eyes:  Vision is WAY better than it was before without corrective eye wear, but it kind of looks like I am wearing 3-D glasses to a movie that isn't 3D.  Also, my near vision is not really there.  I can't see my arm hair, my cuticles or all the close-up flaws on my face right now.  This is making for a much prettier me in the mirror and a few philosophical thoughts on what I can see vs. what is really there.  None-the-less, I hope to regain my close-up vision ASAP.

t minus 16 hours

 ....or so until the PRK surgery.  A big shout out and thanks to Rveblade for the PRK info.  Its good to have a doctor in the house.

I've been trying to get ahead of work because I'll definitely be out Wed-Friday.  Work has been super busy lately anyway.  Usually I have lots of time to blog, facebook, pintrist, Hulu, etc etc etc.  Alas.  All the things I will miss doing with my eyes. 

I picked up my Valium last night and I'm going to go down to the library and get a book on CD to try and not be bored out of my mind.  I'm trying to mentally spin this as a spiritual retreat-- instead of the kind where one takes a vow of silence, I will take a vow of blindness.  If I try to think of it as a positive challenge to overcome perhaps I can defeat the terror, pain, impatience and frustration that wait for me.  Perhaps.

I did realize while I was reading those PRK blogs about not being able to see, that people were still BLOGGING, so I guess it can't be that bad, right?

With that, I plan to have Kyohei document the whole thing with photos tomorrow.  Why not have fun with this.

Also on a positive note, while I won't be able to swim or wear makeup for a time... there are NO restrictions on alcohol.  Thank GOD.  If I can't wear eyeliner, I will definitely need a beer... hell, I won't be driving anywhere anyways!

wish me luck

A life of art, leisure and PRK

 Gah, when did I get so far behind on blogging?  What have I been doing for the last 2 weeks?  

Art & Leisure--I've been seeing lots of shows

First, a few photos recovered from St. Patrick's Day

 

This is how the night started out

This is how the night went

The next weekend was Buket's birthday (on the left), so Mallory and I took her out to a benefit night of wine and live music and food.

The next night, the three of us got together again for the annual Turkish Culture Night dinner and dancing

  

My Turkish classmates and I

The following Tuesday Buket and I went to see the Joffrey Ballet.  It was just fantastic!

The following weekend, I went down to Tampa to spend the weekend with my friend, Mandy and see Come Fly with Me. 

 

It was just amazing!  I've always loved Twyla Tharp's choreography and this did not disappoint.  This 80 minute show felt like 20.  Just... wow

After that we headed off to The Sunken Gardens

 

  

We got rained out and so headed to the beach on Sunday-- this time Ft. De Soto beach, which I hadn't been to before.

 

 

  

Thus, I got my first beach trip and first sunburn of the year.  Good stuff.

In the backdrop of all this fun, I've been stressing about my eyes. 

I had my initial examination to determine whether or not I was a candidate for Lasik surgery.  This eye exam was so horrifying.  For one, it was at 8am and took 3 hours.  During the initially description of the services and procedure I made a drinking game (with my coffee) every time the word "laser" and "cornea" came up. This probably did nothing for my jittery nerves....

Nurse Ratchet, who did the majority of my tests, was brisk and annoyed with me most of the time.  It was really hard to hold my eye open, it really hurt! 

"Open your eye wider, WIDER, I said WIDE!" 

Fucking racist.  Then she was all, "focus on the light and count backwards from 200 by 3."

WTF!?  I can't even really do that when I'm not under huge amounts of stress.  How about back from 50 by fives?  This really reinforced why I hate going to the eye doctor so much... then came the vision tests.  I always feel so stressed out when I don't know the letters (which is a lot because my vision sucks).  "oh GOD, oh GOD!" I think, "I'm fucking blowing this!  I don't even know my letters!  I'm a failure." Then I start to pant and sweat just like in 5-8 grades when I knew I needed glasses, but would sneak to the bathroom and change my numbers or be mysteriously ill during the eye tests.

Then this really hot doctor came in.  I could tell he was hot even though my eyes were fully dilated and I didn't have my glasses on.  THAT hot.  

"which looks better to you," in a cool soothing voice, "one or two?  one or two"

Me thinking "oooooh yeah, touch my face, you can touch my face and my eye all you want...sigh"

Unfortunately this was not my surgeon, just another resident.  alas.  Next the doc who will do the surgery comes in and tells me that I am NOT A CANDIDATE FOR LASIK.  I could hear my dreams popping in my head like tiny little bombs of scattered disappointment and resentment.   Apparently, my corneas are nice and thick, actually thicker than average, but raised on one side (??) 

I would, however, be a candidate for a procedure like Lasik called PRK.  He tells me it is safer than lasik, but has a slightly longer recovery time.  Then he asks if I would like a Valium before the surgery.  I heartily agreed.  I bet those doctors were all talking about what a total spaz I was during the exams.  Whatevs. 

The surgery was schedule for exactly 2 weeks later (GREAT-- two more straight weeks of wearing these #$%& glasses!) and I was sent on my way.

It wasn't until this Monday when I started googling blogs and info about PRK that I had a complete meltdown.  The recovery from PRK sounds incredibly intense and can take as long as 6 months after a painful initial 3 days.

Check out:  http://straightnochaser.org/2007/12/notes-on-prk-eye-surgery/

http://alextran.org/2010/10/07/my-prk-recovery-timeline/

Since then I've calmed down a little bit.  I mean, PRK has been around for a long time and it is the type of corrective eye surgery recommended to police, firemen, athletes and the military.  Well, if its good enough for the military it should be good enough for justgotspaid, right?  I mean it's not like we would do anything to our military that would be willfully hazardous or reckless, right?  Oh wait.  Shit.

Tomorrow is my office's big event:

Wish me luck.