Last week, after four years thinking about it on and off, I called the number for LASIKPlus. I've worn glasses or contacts part time since I was 13, full time since 17. I was fine with it when I could wear contacts without problem, but more and more, I was getting fed up with the whole thing. I had a pair of glasses break recently, and glasses in AZ are, for me, of marginal worth because you basically need to have welding goggles on your face in the summer time; the sun is really intense. That leaves you with using either prescription sunglasses, and changing back and forth between those and your regular glasses, clip on old-people style glasses, photochromatic lenses, or using contacts and regular sunglasses. I felt that the first three ideas basically sucked, and contacts were beginning to get more and more difficult to wear comfortably for long periods of time, so I started thinking about correction surgery again.

A week ago I went in for a consultation. In typical Sean-style snap decision (but really not; I *had* been contemplating this off and on for a while), I decided to have corrective surgery done. As it turned out, they could fit me in that day. I ended up having PRK done instead of LASIK because my corneas are too thin to have LASIK reliably done. I was totally OK with that as I wasn't really keen on having a flap cut in my eyeball (most LASIK complications are due to flap screw ups), and I had a four day weekend to recover from the procedure (PRK's main disadvantage is the longer recovery time).

The older I get in life the more I realize that much of my happiness has to do with expectations. I don't like too many surprises; I'm sort of mildly autistic like that. One time Kari and I got into it a bit because we ended up doing a completely different bike route on a ride than we set out to do. It wasn't that it was a bad thing...it was actually a cool ride, but I sort of hate not knowing what the destination or goal is. I think that's why I enjoy hiking the local hills; the challenge is clear.

How does that relate to my PRK experience? Well, the LASIKPlus people were really clear on what the differences were, and that PRK recovery can sometimes be painful. The recovery time can be slow; it's much slower than LASIK. Taking all that into account, I decided to go for the surgery.

The surgery was extremely quick. It took more time to do the paperwork than anything else. The total process couldn't have been more than 10 minutes. Here's basically what happened for my PRK:

1. I was given a Vallium to chill me out. I can see why people need this; I thought this was mostly for non-contact wearing people that were a bit squeamish about having stuff touch their eye, but when I laid down on the table and got rolled under the laser head, it really began to sink in that this was a huge deal and I was a little freaked out. I'm not sure how effective the Vallium really was, or maybe they just didn't give it enough time to really kick in.
2. They had me lay down on the table of the machine I was having the procedure done on (Alcon Ladarvision). They gave me a big stuffed eyeball to squeeze to get out some nervousness.
3. Little plastic shield type things were taped above and below my right eye. They sort of held my eye open, but I probably could have shut it if I really tried. I don't remember them using an optical speculum, as in LASIK.
4. They put in some numbing drops.
5. They put in some stuff to chemically ablate (basically, melt away) the epiphileal part of my cornea. This takes 30 seconds; I remember hearing the assistant calling off time. It burned a little bit, but it really wasn't bad. Anybody who has has grapefruit juice in the eye has had worse.
6. Once that's done, they washed away that chemical stuff with saline or water or something.
7. Laser time! You're told to continue looking at a flashing red light in the center of the laser head. You hear what sound somewhat likely arcing from a spark plug boot, and I could just make out the faint blue of the excimer laser operating. 7 seconds later, you hear a computer voice that sounds something between the computer voice on Star Trek: Voyager and an Amiga say "Procedure 25% complete...21 seconds remaining." This continues every 25% of completion. The procedure was 28 seconds from start to finish. Ok, here's the vaguely gross part (I think it's kind of funny, though)...you'll start to smell some burning smell. Yep, that's your zorched eyeball bad parts that got vaporized by the laser.
8. After the lasering is done, they once again irrigate the eye with some saline or something to get the junk out, put in a couple of antibiotic drops, and throw in a bandage contact lens
9. The shields were removed. All done with that eye!
10. They then repeated steps 3 through 9 for the left eye.

So here's a day by day breakdown of the things and recovery process since:

• Day 0 (day of surgery): I get up from the table, and while they said that PRK wouldn't have the "wow!" factor that LASIK does, I can immediately read the clock at the other end of the room. Maybe not perfect, but pretty well. I'm driven home by a friend to take a nap, but the cable company is running a jackhammer outside of my apartment and I can't sleep. I talk to my mom on the phone for a bit. After the dilation of my eye went down, I actually drive to go get some food. I go out with Neil and Knappy later to Teakwoods. I can see pretty well, with some distortions. My eyes feel OK....like maybe there's a dirty set of contact lenses in them. Later, as I got tired, and probably because everybody else but Neil was smoking, my eyes got kind of tired and a bit sensitive to light. I wore my sunglasses at night while Neil drove me home. I took a couple of the Tylenol 3's that they gave me in addition to the three different types of eye drops to use four times a day to make sure that I can sleep.
• Day 1: I woke up and feel pretty good. Neil comes and takes me to my follow up appointment in the morning. The doctor is amazed that I'm not having too much pain or wearing sunglasses in the exam room. Apparently, I'm an exceptional PRK patient. Kari came back into town from Malaysia and I drove her Element to the airport to pick her up. Later we go out for food and my eyes start getting tired again like the night before. I got really sensitive to other cars headlights. So Kari drove while I wore sunglasses.
• Day 2: Woke up and I could immediately tell that I wasn't seeing well. I didn't really freak out because I was told this would happen as the cornea started to grow back. I'm still sort of sensitive to light, but nothing that shades couldn't take care of. We went to a Mexican resturant and I couldn't read the menu.
• Day 3: Things became marginally better. I begin to notice that I can see more clearly immediately after I throw in a drop or two. I tried to read my email on the computer later in the evening but it's hopeless.
• Day 4: My vision stays about where it was, then, in the course of about an hour of hanging out with Christine (Kari's sister) and her family, my left eye begins to get markedly clearer. Still can't really read email, but I can read a book when held closely.
• Day 5: I can see pretty well out of my left eye, but my right eye is still kind of fuzzy and ghosting things. I can use a computer, but later I sort of got a little bit of a headache, I presume from the difference in the two eyes. I drove to LASIKPlus for another follow up appointment, and they took out my bandage contacts. I thought my vision would improve after this (I thought some of the fuzziness might have been nasty contact) but it actually gets a bit worse. The doctor explained that this is normal; that the contact holds a relatively normal tear shape over the cornea that sort of masks the irregularities in the cornea as it is rejuvenating itself. I drove back to Kari's while I still had daylight, because it's pretty hard to read street signs. Later, Kari's family tried to teach me to play cribbage, but it's tough because the cards are blurry. I was slightly worried about starting my new job the next day.
• Day 6: I start my new job. It's tough to read but doable. Luckily I didn't have to do too much. Towards the end of the day, things get a little better. I'm no longer sensitive to light. Later that night I noticed that I was even better. Kari was tired, so I drove home, and was fine.
• Day 7 (today): If I put in eye drops I can see damn near perfectly for the few seconds that there is a good tear in my eye. I'm excited about the potential for this. I can use a laptop pretty easily, although it's not perfectly in focus, I'm not having to strain. For the first time, I think my right eye has caught up to or maybe surpassed my left in the recovery. I'm wondering how much longer it will be.

So what else is news? Well, if you caught the clue in the write up above, I started a new job! I decided to leave my old one. I won't say where I work directly, but it rhymes with last word in "Key Largo." That should be enough of a hint. Compensation was the main reason I left the old job. This one is *much* better. There were other reasons for it, but I feel like I've written a ton today and just want to be done.