Since my last posts about my tragic eye injury, I've gained new readers. (Say it with me.."welcome new readers!")
So for those of you who have no idea what's going on, you can read part 1 here.
You can read why I wanted to punch a wall here.
And you can feel super bad for me by reading here.
And now, the saga continues...
Two weeks ago I went to see a corneal specialist. In what I thought would be a last ditch effort before surgery, he decided to switch up my eye drops and ointments.
It didn't work.
I had an appointment today, in which I was anticipating scheduling surgery because let's face it, it's been three months, I've tried everything, and I've still not healed.
NOPE.
Noe nope nope nope.
He decides to put a contact lens bandage on. (Tried it...twice. Didn't work. Did he even read the notes from my eye doctor?)
I get it. We are trying to avoid surgery. Because surgery sucks. They basically have to give me another corneal abrasion to allow my eye to heal. And it is pretty much the most painful thing I've ever endured. Ever.
HOWEVER.
It HAS been three months.
I want to be able to wake up in the morning and not physically hold one eye down while I wait for the "juices" to get going. I don't want to spend 1984875683 minutes a day putting in eye drops. I don't want to move my eyes like a crazy person every 5 minutes just to avoid pain.
I know that surgery is the only thing that will heal me. in a decent amount of time. (Let's be real. A "decent amount of time" has passed. It has passed HARD.)
So we'll see how it goes in two weeks. If he tries to stall anymore, I'm gonna straight up rip out my eye ball right in front of him. Then he HAS to do something. Right? Right.
Once upon a time, there was a girl that got kicked in the face and spent a month and a half recovering from the mother of all corneal abrasions.
As with most tales of victory and triumph, there's always an "almost" win. There's always the two steps back. There's always that moment when you feel like the main character is about to have their moment in the sun. (and then you realize there is still an hour left in the movie so something else is definitely going to go wrong.)
Well, folks. it turns out, there's still an hour left in my movie.
Friday's doctor's appointment (that I talked about here,) was about as bad as I was expecting it to be.
I have a recurring corneal erosion. Which basically means, The top layer of my cornea was violently ripped off and my wound looked just as bad as it did on day 1.
(Ok. I have a flair for the dramatic. But I have to make you all feel sorry for me.)
And also, I have to have laser surgery to permanently fix the problem. So there's that.
Now, the actual wound was not as bad as day 1. My vision was something like 20/60, as opposed to 20/4000. (No, I'm actually not being dramatic there.) And I didn't have to have an eye patch.
They did put a contact lens bandage on my eye, but it came out over the weekend. (during my sister's bachelorette party, at that.)
I slept almost all day Sunday.
I took Monday off and slept the whole day. (I woke up around 3, and did some little chores for Brett, because I love him and he takes good care of me.)
And then it was time for my follow-up appointment.
According to my eye doctor, my eye looked "mucho better!"
Needless to say, I was really super excited to hear that!
I go back on Thursday for another follow-up. And hopefully, after that, there will be no more steps back.
Now, I have to prepare myself for an endocrinologist appointment tomorrow morning that is sure to be awful. Did I mention, that over the past couple of months I've been battling my blood sugar levels? ALL OF THE EYE TRAUMA DRAMA!
Despite the ridiculously long subject line, the story is really quite simple.
I was dancing, and I got kicked in the face.
For those of you that are my Facebook friends, you have watched the saga unravel and develop. There have been ups and downs and a few weird plot twists.
At first, right after "the incident", I thought I just had mascara or an eyelash in my eye. I thought "it's ok, i'll go to sleep and when I wake up, it will be gone."
I was so very wrong. I woke up, still convinced that everything was ok and there was no need for me to enter any kind of medical facility.
My darling boyfriend, Brett, who has a little bit of experience with corneal abrasions, thought differently.
He convinced me to go to a walk-in clinic (It was a Sunday.) When we got to the walk in, they told me I needed to go to the ER.
I'm thinking "ain't no way I'm paying $250 to go to the ER for them to just give me some eye drops and send me on my way."
So I did what any normal 26 year old girl would do and I called my mom. I am crazy lucky that my mom works for an eye doctor. She called the on-call optometrist, then she and my dad met me and Brett at the doctor's office. It was a whole big family affair.
What the eye doctor told me was exactly what Brett told me, except about a zillion times worse. (I'm not being dramatic.)
Basically, i had the worst corneal abrasion in the history of corneal abrasions. (Ok, maybe I'm being a little dramatic)
However, at one point, my doctor was researching tissue grafting. In my eye.
I was frustrated. I was in pain. And I was required to put ointment on a q-tip and shove it in my eye every night. (For the record, I have to do that until at least the end of June, too.)
What would have taken a "normal" person (read: someone who isn't diabetic) just 2 or 3 days to recover, it took me much much longer. I couldn't work that whole week. THE WHOLE WEEK. I couldn't see or concentrate or even stay off medication long enough to even answer a quick email.
Even when I returned to work, I still wasn't 100%...I probably wasn't even 75%, but I couldn't afford anymore time off.
Are you ready for the plot twist?
After 3 weeks (yeah...3 weeks...) my eye finally starts to feel better. My vision isn't completely restored, but its close enough, and I am feeling GOOD!
So one morning I hop out of bed as my alarm goes off (ok that never ever happens) and I rub the sleepy out of my eyes. Except the sleepy doesn't come out of one of them.
I know what you're thinking. It's the injured eye! Its playing tricks on me!
You are wrong.
my "good eye" is now having the EXACT same symptoms as the injured eye was. So, after a few days of denial, I make another eye appointment.
My eye doctor (who is completely amazing, by the way) told me it could be one of two things.
1. My eye injury (one I had 19 years ago) could be acting up. (Now, of all times, really!)
2. My eye is having "sympathy pains." YEAH, ITS A REAL THING.
So basically, my eye is doing the exact same thing my injured eye was doing after the corneal abrasion occurred. (cloudy vision, pain, burning, watery, etc.)
I had to repeat the same treatment in my "good eye" as my injured eye.
Currently it's been 1 month and 1 day since "the incident"...I am virtually symptom free, although I still have the occasional flare-up, where I wake up in the middle of the night, and my eye feels like its going to explode, and then I freak out. But it never lasts more than about 45 minutes and then life is good.
I am still putting drops and ointments in my eye daily, and will have to continue that until my follow up appointment at the end of June.
As a person who likes to find the silver lining in crappy situations, here are the sparkles I found:
1. I wasn't wearing my glasses (which is odd) and I could have had glass being pulled out of my eye.
2. I got to sleep A LOT.
3. I know more about the cornea than anyone who isn't an eye doctor.
4. My friends and family gave me warm fuzzy feelings of love with their outpouring of love and support!
So there it is. The story of how I got kicked in the face.
Swing dancing is fun. Its just that every 6 years or so, you might get kicked in the face.
