Yeah, I couldn’t help myself with that photo. LOL!
I can’t believe it’s been 10 days since I last blogged. Okay – well, yes I can. I had the eye resurfacing done (I have some photos, will try to add when I have a bit more time on the computer). It went like this:
Last Thursday (a week and a day ago): Surgery. Not that much pain, though some weirdness, etc.
Friday (a week ago): Came back for post-op surgery. Had been assiduously taking the pain meds, drops, etc. – and my vision ROCKED. I mean REALLY rocked. It was unbelievable. Dr. Kathy said “yeah, this is the best day. For the next 2-3 days, your vision will cloud back over, and you’ll be in a lot of pain. Here’s my cell phone, but don’t call me if you’re in pain or you can’t see. Because you will be, and you won’t be able to.”
They’d put a big contact over both eyeballs (most people do this one eye at a time, but I wasn’t sure I could take that – mind you, then you actually “see faster and hurt less”). The big contact basically holds your eye together. Then, it heals “underneath” it. As Dr. Kathy explained, it heals “like a peace sign or a Mercedes logo” – from the outside, in. So as it heals, you are ultimately “seeing through” the seams, hence, the “worser and worser” vision. As for the pain, well, yeah, deal with it (laugh).
Saturday: Pain is bad. H starts setting alarm so that he can get me up to take a pain pill and put the drops in my eyes. Lots of crying and trying to be brave.
Sunday: Feeling a LOT better, though can’t really see. Saturday H has been gallivanting and needs me to “approve” a couple of purchases he wants to make, one of which is a big oryx head. So we go off to Petaluma, and this was REALLY silly of me to do. I can’t really see, I have no depth perception, and even with sunglasses on, etc. etc. it’s super duper painful. Funniest thing in the day is he hands me a bill to go nextdoor and get us 2 coffees, I order them and barrista says “um, we can’t make change for this…” – I thought he’d given me a $10, it’s $100. It strikes me as VERY FUNNY. And we got free coffee. How’s about them apples.
Monday: Not so great. Pain is lessening, but eyesight is definitely at its worst. Lie in bed most of the day. Find chocolate stash that I swore I was strong enough to resist, and Christmas macaroons I had literally piled the ENTIRE freezer’s contents on top of. I might be blind, but I can dig. In the evening, could really “see myself” in the mirror for the first time and after washing my face found myself reaching up to TAKE MY CONTACTS OUT! OMG! I could just see myself saying to Dr. Kathy the next day “um, yeah, no, the contact didn’t fall out, I actually TOOK it out” (pulling all the new skin with it…….aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh!!!) Made me realize that for the first time in about 42 years I can see “well enough” without glasses or contacts. Every night when I have brushed my teeth and washed my face since I was like 8 years old I have then either taken out my contacts, or taken off my glasses. OLD OLD OLD habits die hard! Amazing.
Tuesday; Dr. Kathy says I am doing great, removes cover-contacts. To do this she uses a tiny tiny (dollhouse sized) “broom” to “sweep” them off from the bottom. Yeah there was a bunch of stuff like that to say about the surgery but never mind. (The worst part about the surgery wasn’t so much all that but the SMELL of BURNING FLESH EYEBALL – ack! That is the ONE thing they hadn’t warned me about!) Dr. Kathy told me that the “seams” were closed on the left eye, and you couldn’t even see them any more. On the right eye, they were there, but closed. She said I didn’t have to sleep in my sexy steampunk goggles any more. Whoot Whoot! Mom took me to this visit and it was fun to have some time together. Funniest part about that – I put my hand on the release lever to put my seat back down in her car (to put eyedrops in) just as she did one of those “quick starts” she seems to like to do – and as the seat lever was released, I literally went from straight backed UP to dead flat DOWN in a second. I started laughing and she looked over from the Driver’s Seat and said “Where did you GO?!” Yeah she’s having cataract surgery in a few weeks. It was pretty hilarious . . .
Wednesday: Went to see Alex down the street because I had cabin fever. That was great. Still no computer until Friday (then, only 15 minutes on, 1 hour off). Dr. Kathy had said “driving likely” by Monday, working out against by Thursday, but no real “stress” until after I see her again (which is like the 28th I think). I’m not quite sure what that means. Oh and no makeup, face lotion, swimming. The face stuff sucks, My eyes are all weird because of the drops. The skin under them has a dried drop film on it. I try to “dab” it but it’s like cement. Can’t WAIT until I can really WASH MY FACE and PUT ON SERUM! Had my second experience of “reaching up” to “take out my contacts” in the mirror. Funny -habits die hard!
Thursday: My friend Tracey from the Crossfit box took me to the Farmer’s Market and to Andy’s. I still couldn’t see the numbers on the bill denominations. She also had to work the ATM for me. It was GREAT to get out and GREAT to see her. Sheila also was down (broke a tooth) from Nevada, so I got to see her, too, that morning. GREAT day! Exhausted at the end though,and couldn’t see particularly well. I think my eyes were just tired.
Friday: Today – first day back at the computer! Cleaned out email – had posted a few selfies to Facebook in the week interim, but that was basically it. Tried to keep it to the 15 minutes on/1 hour off but yeah, THAT Happened. I gotta get off now because I don’t want to be at that “tired eye” stage. Can see $ denominations – so that shows you, I’m healing FAST. Even forgetting to put in drops which would have been IMPOSSIBLE even up to yesterday – but i must remember because i can’t get “behind” on that. (Have to put in drops every hour at a minimum.) DEFINITELY feel better today. I still can’t see super great, but I could TOTALLY drive. The itch being gone is SO NICE!
So, in sum, I’ve gained MORE weight, and now have on the “front burner” to try to follow up with the new endocrinologist that Willie suggested. Yeah okay, fine, and since now all the chocolate and macaroons are GONE (dot dot dot)…will be able to exercise starting next week. Need to put the chin-up bar together so that we can start the “eccentric” exercises from The Calorie Myth.
Also went through an ENORMOUS pile of mail, bills, etc. today. They said that I will need reading glasses, but not as strong as before. I can definitely see without them – the ones I’ve been using are way too strong. Things are still cloudy, but in super bright light I could at least see enough to get the bill amount into billpay ;-)
I think that’s enough for now. Also re-organized my Pinterest page today, which I’ve been meaning to do for FOREVER. Put some great new videos and such there.
Glad to hear the recovery is going well, Sandy!!
Your focus shouldn’t be about your weight gain, silly lady.. worry about getting back to being able to function your normal day-to-day life, then back at it :)
I agree – to some extent. It’s time to “do something” about it though – whether it’s revisiting my thyroid hormones, tying up my idiot endocrinologist and MAKING him listen….something like that ;-)