Seeing Stars: My New Surgically Enhanced Vision

On Thursday evening, I returned from band practice.  The sky was black with night, and as I exited the car, I looked upward and saw stars.  With my blurry, cataract-burdened eyesight, I hadn't seen stars in a night sky for some time.  They were lovely.

I had a checkup yesterday to see how my cataract surgery is healing.  The doctor said it looks great, and my visual acuity is greater than expected - 20-15?  The doctor said "Wow" when he measured it.  Not bad for an eye that I previously considered to be nearly useless.

The surgery on my left eye is scheduled for April 28.  Now I need to make a decision.  Should the left eye be fitted with a lens that will leave it somewhat nearsighted?  The doctor recommends this, as I will then be able to read without reading glasses.  My left eye would be for reading and close-up viewing, my right eye for driving and distance viewing.

Right now, I am leaning towards making the left eye like the right, so I can see distance with added clarity.  I will happily wear reading glasses for close-up viewing.

I don't have to decide right away.  I will wait until my right eye is completely healed from the surgery, and see how it does with close-up viewing.

Back from Cataract Surgery: I Can SEE!

On Tuesday, January 13, I had cataract surgery on my right eye.  For the past couple of days following the surgery, I have been resting and recuperating.  I opted to have the right eye done first, as it was my worst eye, almost useless for years.  I could see out of the eye, but my vision was noticeably blurrier and darker than that of my left eye.  I relied on my left eye to get around.

I have been preparing for the surgery for several weeks, putting prescribed drops in my eye, planning which motel to stay in the night before my 6:45 AM appointment at the vision clinic.  When I found myself laying on a hospital bed that was being pushed through halls and rooms, the overhead lights whizzing by, I knew the time had finally arrived.  Then I was pushed under a white machine and suddenly felt some anxiety.  Preparation time is over, this is it!  My eye, my vision, my sight are in the hands of strangers.  Hope they know what the hell they're doing.

The doctor put drops in my eye, then put a gizmo into my eye that prevents me from blinking and closing the eye.  Intense light is then beamed into the eye; tears slide from my eye, but I can't blink or escape the light.  I see a ring of black dots as a laser is lowered onto my eye, and I hear the clack clack clack of it cutting through the cornea.  "Looks great," the doc says and my bed moves again, to a different room and machine.  Now I stare at a red dot with more clack clack clacking.  The doctor is destroying my natural lens, sucking it out somehow.  Next, he floats an artificial lens over my eyeball and somehow pokes it into place.  He closes the cornea flap and tapes gauze and an eye patch over my eye.  I'm done.  It took ten minutes, didn't hurt much at all, and doesn't hurt hardly at all, now that it's over.

The next morning I visit the doctor in his office for a followup.  The nurse takes the eye patch off.  I wait until it is all stripped away before opening my eye.  And there's the world!  I can see.  I check the difference between my right and left eyes by putting my palm over one, and then the other.  It is obvious that my right eye is now far better than my untreated left.  The right has sharper focus and white appears white, not white with a yellowish tinge, as with my left eye.

The doctor tells me the eye will get better over the next few days, as it heals.  I am thrilled!  I have no longer any need of glasses for the right eye, and I opt not to wear my glasses at all.  I can see that well.

I am impatient to have the left eye repaired next.  Due to the tax season starting, it will probably have to wait until after April 15.