Oh sure, blame the little guy with...

[February]

...one eye!

Scheduled to have surgery on my left eye on the 25th, if all goes according to plan...

I'm hoping that despite the complicating factors and risks they bring with them that I won't end up the Fairy with one eye. But since the left one is purely decorative at this point and no good for seeing at all, if they have a chance to even try to restore any vision in it, I feel I have to go for it, especially since my right eye is deteriorating so rapidly and the only alternative is the very real reality of losing my vision altogether.

Normally this would be no thing at all- this is after all the most common surgery done in America today (granted, usually people have forty years on me by that point) it's not the procedure itself that's the trouble, it's the underlying defects in the structure of my eyes- and they just won't know until they do it if they can stand up to the operation. Only way to find out is to try it, and since I can't see out of the left eye at all, I finally knew I had to just 'gut up' as Dr. Phil would say and go for it.

So.

Wish me luck guys! I wish I could get it done today. I hate waiting around for stuff like this.

I'm really hoping that by Christmas I'll be able to see the lights again without seeing literally sixteen lights in a semi-circle for every one bulb I look at.

Bru

[Elena (aka: Bubble Lady)]

[font="Palatino Linotype"]wishing you all the luck in the world bru! here's looking at you kid! kisses and HUUUUUUGGGGGGSSSSSSSSSSS too! [/font]

[hobie16]

Good luck Bru!!!

[Ms. Matterhorn]

Are you having cataract surgery, Bru? My husband had that last summer, both eyes. He's 57. He sees WAY better than I do now. Better than 20-20, just needs reading glasses.

I'll pray for you. Let us know how it went afterward.

[DisneyMom]

Best Wishes for a Speedy Recovery :)

[Zazu]

Scheduled to have surgery on my left eye on the 25th, if all goes according to plan...

Wish me luck guys!

Break a ... n eyelash!

[GRUMPY PIRATE]

Good, luck, and just think, for a few days ya can wear an eye patch fer real!!!!

hehehehe

[Ms. Matterhorn]

Have somebody draw a skull and crossbones on that eyepatch! :piratefla

[GRUMPY PIRATE]

Have somebody draw a skull and crossbones on that eyepatch! :piratefla

I can loan her mine!!

the one that started it all!!!

(DL eye injury!!)

[February]

Aww, you guys are the best! I'm up at all hours again and here you are waiting for me!

First off...I want to hear the DL eye injury story I missed that! Is it posted someplace, Pirate?

Second, Yes my dear Ms. Matterhorn, it is cataract surgery. Like I said no big thing...unless it's my eye *banging head against screen*. Why oh why am I not normal? (shhh. no comments from the peanut gallery LOL)

I have matching PSC cataracts in both eyes, those are behind the lenses (they have two theories- one is they came from too much prednisone, but another is that I may well have been born with them. If that's so they'll have a different consistency than those developed later- and will be 'sticky' and it'll be harder to remove the lens itself) But in the left eye I also have a lovely 'dense nuclear sclerosis' going on smack dab in the center of the front of my lens, entirely blocking my vision. This is what is what made it get worse so much faster and they just don't know what caused/is causing it. They can't see in, so they know I can't see out!

Now, add to the fact that my eyes are (and they said this) extra large, and 'hyper-deep' in the anterior region, add that I already have all kinds of free-floating pigment floating around and they don't know why- add that my iris' are much thinner than normal (they've been compared to 'wet toilet paper') and now we're talking they don't know if, look away if you're squeamish- you've been warned....










....if my eye will just collapse when they try to replace the lens.

They're going to have all kinds of fun things like 'iris hooks' and 'capsular tension rings' standing by to use to shore stuff up while they work. Thing is, the surgeon said he just won't know till they get there if the surrounding eye structures can support the pull of those devices! ACK!!!!

So yeah, not a fun mental image. I've been carrying that around for a good long while and my first response to the idea of them trying surgery in view of these risks was "hell no!" but now that I know I will very definitely not be able to see anything soon if I don't, I figure letting them try on the worse eye is the only way to go.

I'm actually trying to talk myself 'up' at this point and thinking of all I might be able to see again after it's over. Right now my eyes compete- they each see different things (all I see in the left is a big blur unless it's dark, then streetlights/headlights look like those 'movie star' mirrors in dressing rooms, you know the kind with the lights all the way around?) since I see halos around everything with the right eye, it's very disorienting.

The last time we saw Wishes, it was a very psychedelic experience, tell you that much.

When I close the left eye entirely then the right is still distorted and hence why I'm forcing myself to do this.

Only other alternative is to hitch up the cat to a harness and make him the world's first seeing eye cat. He's smart. He could do it.

"break an eyelash..." LOL I like that, Zazu!

My husband, I can tell, is very relieved that I'm at least willing to try the surgery. He didn't want to pressure me but I can tell he's glad now. That's the other thing- I don't want to be any more of a burden to him ever than my body already makes me. I just don't have the right to wimp out on this.

So! Hopefully when I come around from sedation I'll still have as many eyes as I started with. If not, well I gave it a shot!

Thanks again for listening, you guys are the BEST! I can't tell my family how much this really scares me. I have to be the brick wall, you know. Show no fear. They can't stand to see me any other way, and I can't even tell my parents about this until it's over, no way. My mother already made her opinion on the matter known months ago.

Bru