I’m not sure how many of our wonderful readers know this, but I’m a longtime wearer of glasses. Yes, that photo of me you see along with my articles boasts no specs, but I do, on occasion, wear contact lenses.
But, I mostly wear glasses, and I’ve been wearing glasses since the second grade. I was never a fan of glasses, and I can remember yearning for years to be “old enough” to start wearing contact lenses. It was a long wait—I’m pretty sure I was about 15 when I finally got my first pair of contact lenses, and after the initial “Holy crap, this is awesome, I don’t have to wear glasses” thing wore off, the annoyance of getting those little bastards in my eyes in the morning and out of my eyes at night started to get to me.
Over the years, just the awareness of having something on my eyeballs started to irritate me, and, since I wore soft lenses, there was always that occasion when I ended up putting one in incorrectly because, for some reason, it wasn’t always easy to tell whether they were inside out or not.
Today, I will be getting laser surgery on my eyes.
I’ve been wanting to do this for a long time, and I probably waited longer than I should have. My brother got LASIK roughly 15 years ago, and he has been extremely happy with it. At the time he had it done, I just wasn’t ready to do it. The procedure involves the cutting of a “corneal flap,” and that kind of freaked me out. Everyone I know who’s had their eyes lasered has had positive things to say about it, and calls it life-changing.
The procedure I’m getting is newer than LASIK, doesn’t involve the flap, and therefore has a quicker recovery time. I decided I was ready for LASIK a few months ago, but when I learned about this new procedure, I was really excited. I went in for an evaluation earlier this week, and lucky me, they had an opening Friday for me to get zapped, so, pretty soon, it’s going to be pew! pew! pew! perfect vision… hopefully. Technically, there’s always a risk it won’t work and will make my vision worse, though it’s probably less than me dying from COVID. <rimshot>
I admit, as excited as I am about this upcoming procedure, there’s a small part of me that is nervous. We are talking about my eyeballs here. So, please, if you’ve ever had refractive surgery, do share your experiences in the comments below—preferably the positive ones. I’ve already paid for the procedure in advance and I’m not turning back. I’m anxiously awaiting being free from glasses and contacts!
After the surgery, I’ll be taking a doctor-mandated nap to rest my eyes, but I hope to give you an update as soon as possible!
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