Hey everyone! I decided to start this blog to document my experience with LASIK eye surgery ... from pre-op appointments to post-op experiences - the whole shebang! Besides the initial research I did on the procedure, what helped me prepare to take the plunge the most was all of the personal experience blogs I came across and talking with people who recently had it done. I know a lot of my friends are on the fence about exploring this option more seriously, so I hope this will help them in one way or another.
I have had the wonderful (please note the sarcasm) experience of relying on glasses to see for 20 years, contacts a little more than 10. I have an astigmatism in both eyes, which means the curvature of my eyes are shaped more like a football than that of a sphere, or a baseball (which I attribute to my diehard love for football and the New England Patriots) which distorts my vision dramatically. It makes it so I cannot see fine details both up close and at a distance. For instance, if you are standing a bit of a distance away from me (but really not that far), I can see the outline of your body, but I cannot see your facial features; it's all a blur. I probably couldn't tell if you were looking at me or not. Another example: I can typically see an exit sign outline at a little distance, but I can't really see the word "Exit"; it all blends together. My eyesight without the help of glasses is 20/300 in my right eye, and 20/200 in my left (yeah, seriously). That basically means (besides being pretty blind!) that when I stand 20 feet from something, I can see what someone with "normal" eyesight can see at 300 feet ... yeah. Last night, my eye doctor said I have a "unique" astigmatism (while smirking). Another one of my eye doctors once told me if my parents did not take me to the eye doctor back when they did (I was in first grade), that I could have become legally blind, making it harder to correct. However, I just learned that 20/200 vision is the cutoff for legal blindness in the US ... Great! Talk about scary! Needless to say, when I heard that LASIK existed, I was instantly interested.
Back when I heard about LASIK (I was probably a teenager), I wasn't even a candidate. Patients with an astigmatism did not qualify. I stayed confident that, eventually, science would progress enough to make me a candidate. Heck, when I first started wearing contacts, I had to buy one set at a time and would have to wear them for a full year. They were horrible! They were HUGE (you could see them when you just looked me in the eyes), uncomfortable, and anyone who wears contacts knows they oftentimes develop calcium deposits (little white bumps, usually from overuse) on them which make them even more uncomfortable and seemingly kept my vision from being top notch. This was back when monthly disposable contacts were new and, of course, not meant for people with bad astigmatisms like myself. I also contracted conjunctivitis a few times which meant having to get rid of the contacts that were supposed to last me a year and get new ones. After a back and forth battle with that, and not wanting my parents to keep shelling out hundreds of dollars every time I had to get a new set of contacts (of course, since my eyesight was so bad, contacts were pricey!), I decided to stick with the glasses for a while. Years later, I was given the gift of qualifying for monthly disposable contacts! Horray! I couldn't believe it. It made me start thinking about how I just might possibly now qualify for LASIK. I spoke with my doctor about it and he said something I couldn't believe. I was actually a potential candidate! He wanted me to wait a few years until I hit my mid twenties where my eyesight would most likely be pretty stable before moving forward with a consultation.
Fast forward a few years and here I am! I was patient for so long and decided to go for it on a whim this year. I made sure I could afford it (saving money each week and working out some financing) and shopped around at different local facilities. I ended up going with Nashua Eye Associates in Nashua, NH, which is actually my eye doctor. I felt comfortable enough to give them a call since they already knew my entire eye history (they are the only eye doctors I have seen for 20 years). I mustered up enough courage to call and spoke to a really nice woman (who actually knew one of my brothers and many of my friends) who set up a consultation appointment. I was already feeling really great about this decision.
A few weeks ago I took my mom and went in for a general consultation. This is where I met the team (surgeon and assistants), took a couple of eye tests and went through an interview process. The eye doctor/surgeon, Dr. D., asked me questions to ensure he felt comfortable with performing the surgery on me and I was able to ask him a lot of questions to ensure I felt comfortable with him ... these are my eyes, afterall! Turns out, my aunt worked with him for 10 years and my cousin was his physical therapist when he hurt his shoulder (and all on awesome terms with each other)! From that point on, I felt even more comfortable because there was now a personal aspect tied to it. All of my questions were answered and he said he felt comfortable with moving forward to the next step, but stressed that if the next round of testing showed anything that made him feel even slightly uncomfortable, he wouldn't move forward. That made me feel even better knowing that he wasn't going to do anything he wasn't comfortable with just to make a couple of bucks.
I made my next appointment to come in for a marathon session of eye tests (3 hours roughly). ***Important to note: Do not wear your contacts for at least 3 days before going in for this exam.*** Your eyes swell when you wear them and they cannot get accurate measurement readings for the surgery. I made this mistake and had to come back another time (a miscommunication). That appointment happened last night. They tested for everything under the sun: The dreaded "puff" test, measurements of my cornea, collected my tears (sounds so creepy!), measured my astigmatism, measured the thickness of my cornea (very important. If it's too thin, it's a no-go), and checked my prescription. The doctor also dilated my pupils (they are still dilated almost 24 hours later, which was to be expected) and checked for any "skeletons" as he put it, which would be any underlying eye diseases that the other tests couldn't pick up. I was told I was good to go! I couldn't believe it. I really wanted to cry because I was so happy. I was then taken into an office to schedule my surgery (they only do this once a month) and went over some specifics and got some prescriptions (Valium, yay!). I then paid and went on my merry way. It was official. Oh, and I made sure I was cleared to drink on Sunday for the Super Bowl (GO PATS!) I was not the only one to ask this question, apparently! I half wanted to ask for an extra Valium to calm my nerves for the game ;)
The price I am paying for All-Laser LASIK is $1995 each eye. I was able to get approved for financing through CareCredit, luckily, otherwise I wouldn't be able to get this done for probably a year or two. The price tag can give some a little sticker shock, but there is no amount of money that can describe being able to see independently ... not to mention all of the money saved over my lifetime on new lenses, frames, contacts, solutions, cases, cleaners, etc. I'll never forget what it was like for me to put glasses on for the first time back when I was six or seven. "That's how everything looks?!" It was a no-brainer for me to move forward with this.
My surgery is THIS coming Tuesday, February 7th, 2012. I go in for 3:15pm and my surgery is at 3:40pm. They say I will be there for an hour and a half, but the procedure itself only lasts 15 seconds each eye! Unbelievable!
If I don't update before, I will certainly update after my surgery!
I'm so excited. But more importantly right now, GO PATRIOTS!! :D
No comments:
Post a Comment