In an exciting new turn of events, a drama has unfolded that involves one of my eyeballs.
You heard me correctly.
I have what’s called “recurrent erosion.â€
Prior to this summer, if you had mentioned recurrent erosion, I would have guessed you meant a condition dunes suffers from periodically during a rough storm season.Â
I am now decidedly unhappy to report that apparently, your cornea can erode as well.
Recurrently.
And painfully.Â
Apparently, my top layer is torn and probably has been for about a year. There may or may not have been a Nerf gun incident that may or may not have taken place well over a year ago that may or may not be responsible for my cornea’s recurrent erosion. It seems to be having trouble repairing itself, which manifests itself in pain and eyeball sensitivity.
The solution to my eyeball woes, it appears, begins with trying regular applications of salt drops and a jelly-like substance for a time to see if that helps it heal. I sincerely hope the good people at Bausch & Lomb know what they are doing, because boric acid is one of the ingredients in the drops I now regularly put in my eyeball.Â
Round these parts, we use boric acid to kill palmetto bugs water bugs roaches.
The next option, should the drops fail, involves a special contact. But it’s option three that makes me light-headed and nauseous just considering it. Because option three involves a needle that is inserted into my eyeball.
Y’all, I am not saying this next sentence to be funny. I seriously think I could sooner observe my own open-heart surgery than watch someone casually insert a needle into my eyeball. I am the person, after all, who lived with the pain for over a year, often going through my daily tasks with one eye shut, all to avoid having an ophthalmologist come near my eyeball with a cotton swab. It’s not the pain that scares me; it’s the idea of something inserted into my eyeball, something metal-like and sharp, while I sit observing.
That just isn’t right.
I didn’t ask the doctor much about this possible step, because frankly, I don’t want to know. But then, in a moment of weakness, I googled the whole dastardly (I feel that this is the correct adjective here) idea. This was not one of my better decisions. I quickly stopped when the procedure started sounding like the doctor would basically be practicing his cross-stitch on my eyeball while mending the erosion.
I didn’t even try to read up on option four. It involves a laser.
By the way, did you notice I’ve used the word “eyeball†10 times so far? It’s intentional.
As a funny side note, the medicine I have to put in my eyeball makes my eyeliner run and quickly fade away. Consequently, on days when I apply eyeliner in the morning and don’t look in the mirror again until evening, I often look, if I’m to be honest here, not unlike a Cyclops, my one makeup-free eye fading into the recesses of my tired face.
If you are an eye care professional or a person at all, I really wouldn’t mind your advice here (given a safe distance from my eyeball, naturally), as I’m just rational enough about this whole thing to realize I’m not being rational at all.
But be gentle, please.Â
In life and in eye care, there’s only so much I want to know.
I get to visit the optho every other year, and have since Easter Saturday when I was 15. That day, during indoor color guard practice, I was hit in the left eye with a flagpole. One that you twirl in marching band. One week of lying in the dark, having drops put in regularly to keep the pupil dilated so that it could heal, no TV, reading, or bright light, and another week of no gym and being able to walk around high school with sunglasses on, and I was on the mend. Yearly, then every two year, check ups followed. I have permanent scratches on the cornea, the pupil sphinctor muscle was torn and therefore does not close as small as the right eye, and I have a trauma cataract that looks like a fingerpainted asterisk. Yes, they’ve taken photos of it. The pupil issue causes too much light to get in on bright days, so even with sunglasses my left eyelid will close. The cataract issue means that I am looking through a white sheer curtain all the time, which makes putting on eye make-up or doing anything like reading or driving with my right eye closed rather fuzzy and difficult. But until I can’t see out or they can’t see in to examine, cataract replacement is on hold. Having that surgery scares me. But it will be necessary eventually.
Take a deep breath, take care of the eye, and remember that millions of people have had eye surgery or laser surgery and come out just fine.
Oddly, even after all of that, I didn’t need glasses until I turned 32.
Wow, I had to reread that to try to catch it all. I’m so sorry you’ve had to go through that. I can’t imagine how traumatic that must have been, nor can I imagine sitting in the dark for that long. And you were so young, relatively speaking. Do you wear regular sunglasses or do yours have to have certain features?
You are right, of course, about the fact that millions of people have done it and survived. I actually have two family members who have had needles inserted in their eyes for different reasons. One still does regularly, in fact. So I try to keep that in mind, and not think about it too much. Fortunately too, I’ve been busy with work, so I forget about it when it doesn’t hurt.
Also, when you do eventually have surgery, I hope it goes well!!
For sunglasses I prefer large lenses in frames that sit close to my face. They were hard to find for a couple of years when sunglasses had these little lenses which did nothing to keep the sun out of your eyes. They were supposed to just look cool. And the lenses are polarized to cut down on glare. If the day is really sunny, then even with sunglasses I will often close that left eye. I’m pretty used to it, so when I do have the surgery being able to see clearly out of that eye will take some getting used to.
I’m sorry that you have to go through the process, too. A cut on your arm – Neosporin and a bandage. A deep enough cut (like from cutting a bagel, which I’ve done twice) – maybe a few stitches. But the eye. Ugh. Hope the first process does the trick!
Thanks. I’m cautiously optimistic; the pain seems slightly less and doesn’t last quite as long.
I’ve gotten more used to the one eye closed thing as well, although your experience with it is obviously much more extensive than mine. I use larger sunglasses too, and am extra careful about wearing them frequently right now.
Thanks for all your insights!