The Eyes Have It

    Here we are, another week in the land of aging gracefully.  Aging gracefully; it sounds a bit oxymoronic doesn't it?  What is it about aging that's graceful?  Nothing that I can think of, not the root canals, colonsocopies, knee replacements, or in my special case eye surgery could be termed graceful

  To cut to the chase, I have cataracts.  A friend of mine told me I should call it something else because cataracts sounds so, well, old person. Retinitis?  Opacity of the lens? Or perhaps blind as a bat and getting worse?  Whatever you call it, the result is the same, I can't see clearly anymore.  This condition isn't sudden. It takes years to develop. I've known it's been lurking behind my baby-blues for quite awhile. Remember those commercials for Mr. Clean when you were a kid? Cuts through waxy build-up? That's what I have on my eyes, waxy build-up.  I've never been able to see well, so what's different? Turns out what's different is that lately I can't see at night. Or rather, I see lots of things at night, the trouble is they don't exist; people walking down the middle of the road, vehicles that aren't really there, animals jumping out from the bushes, and lights shining where they shouldn't be. Apparently my filmy eyes now refract light. Some nights there are nothing but damn disco balls and stobe lights out there. You can see what I'm up against.  

  There is no cure but surgery, which is what I am off to do tomorrow morning. Doctors waving scalpels around my eyeballs make me nervous. Doctors putting scalpels into my eyeballs is swoon worthy. Fortunately, they promised me good drugs.

  The photo above is of the first eye to go under the knife. They do them one at a time by the way; just in case of an oops moment. That insures you have one left, no matter how badly you see out of it. The above eye (which shall be known heretofore as "exhibit A" is my bad eye. The vision in that eye is 20/250. For those of you with hawk eyes, that means that I can see at 20 feet what you can see at 250 feet. To further illustrate, I can't see much. So if the surgeon is having a bad morning, hungover, not enough coffee, or is preoccupied with how his investments are doing, at least it's my bad eye.

   There is a complicated eye drops routine involved. Two different sorts for the next 6 weeks with descending doses. The first eye I can probably manage, but before I am done with the first eye, the second eye, not wanting to be left out of the fun, begins it's doses too. I'm going to have to create a spread sheet to keep track of which one gets what when. I can see it's going to be a little like air traffic control at O'Hare.

  I had high hopes that since I was getting new subsurface lenses, that at least I would be able to view the world without glasses. Not a chance.  My vision issue is myopia, I can't see anything unless it is two inches from my nose. I am also blessed with an astigmatism, meaning things blur together. Because I have these two things in tandem I have to choose whether I want to see near or far. What kind of a choice is that? Do I want to read street signs or watch T.V.? I am told I will need glasses to correct for whichever I don't choose.  This the whole process is annoying. Where is medical science when you need it?