I can see clearly now…

It’s amazing, after over 15 years of wearing glasses, I was finally able to bid ‘Adieu’ to them. I just got the LASIK (laser-assisted in situ keratomileusis) surgery done. It is a type of refractive surgery for correcting myopia or shortsightedness.

Basically what they do is open a flap from the cornea and then laser the cornea to remodel it and replace the flap, this diagram shows the basic steps of LASIK, I know it sounds really scary, and to be honest I was really anxious about it, cos after all it is the eyes and what do you do, if something goes wrong???? But after much consideration and research I finally decided to go ahead with it. You can read more about it on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LASIK

It was pretty strange, the whole thing was done in about 30mins (15min per eye including all preparations) They just put some anesthetic eye drops to freeze the eye before performing it, and it was so strange, cos I could see and feel and hear throughout and it was weird seeing equipment coming at your eyes initially but later I could only see the light, and it was not painful at all, just a bit funny cos I felt pressure on the eyes. Though my sight was blurry soon after the operation, I went home and had a nap of a couple of hours as they suggested, and when I woke up, it was like a miracle, I could see clearly!

What was funniest was the surgery discussions! The doc and nurses were talking about Shrek while lasering the eye! And one nurse said that she liked Donkey and doc laughed and told me ‘we like to keep the atmosphere light’ and I told him that I liked donkey too, to which the doc responded by saying in that case he will stop himself from saying something rude thing about Donkey! It was just hilarious thinking back!

These days (for first 2 weeks) I have to be a bit careful till the eyes completely recover and so have to wear these funny ‘Mad Scientist about to conduct a major chemical experiment’ like protective glasses, or Sun glasses if the light is too bright even inside, which a friend has started calling my ‘Stevie Wonder’ look and at night like a Fly with 2 funny bulging flaps on the eyes!

But other than that, everything is great! It’s wonderful waking up in the morning and being able to see without having to reach for the glasses (even the initial discomfort I felt seems to be gone)… I;m still getting used to seeing with my own eyes, sometimes when I go home after work, I think of taking off the contacts.

It’s a lot of small things, which I;m sure someone who has never had problems with sight wouldn’t have even noticed, like now I can sit at a comfortable distance from the computer, unlike before when I used to sit with my nose almost touching the screen when I was not wearing the contacts or glasses! And when I look out from the window near my desk I can see the mountains in the distance clearly.

It’s going to be great to go swimming next time cos I will actually be able to see from a distance and reduce the risk of bumping into people or having to suddenly move away after seeing someone come at you too late!

I still can’t believe it’s real! It’s amazing!