The Other Eye

That's right. I have two. Surprise!!!

One has been fixed, at least as far as replacing a cataract with a lens which turned that eye back into one which could see something besides black with brown for bright lights like, say, the sun. It's time to replace the lens in the other eye.

I knew it was coming. My eye surgeon, who sees me twice a year now, has been suggesting it for a few years. Since he did such a splendid job on the first one, and we're moving to where I'd need a new doctor, I decided to have the one I trust perform the second surgery. So, now is the time.

It's scheduled for Halloween. I've been telling people that means my costume this year is going to be a red-eyed monster. If they don't laugh, I don't care since I'm not going anywhere afterwards anyway. Except home of course. To sleep in my recliner because that's the only place I will sleep on my back, and I'm under orders not to sleep on my side for a few days after.

I've already had two pre-surgery appointments. Tomorrow is a third, but not with the eye doc this time. It's with the cardiologist. The eye doc insists I return them a clean bill of pre-surgical health for my pacemaker. I didn't even have one for the first procedure. My cardiology clinic won't just sign a paper. I have to show up in person, get an EKG, and they'll review my pacemaker record from over the summer, among other things to make sure the return to taking metoprolol is doing its job too, slowing down its familiar impulse to trot off lickety-split with A-fib. That returned, I got some meds, then got reassured that my heart will not slow down too much because the pacer will kick in if it tries. Steve's heart did so he wound up in the hospital with a pulse in the 20s. Thus I knew to ask. (He's fine now, BTW.)

It's also a chance to have a proper excuse to bill the insurance company. It's OK, they earn it. And I'll be back in their office again just a few days after the surgery for the regular run of tests, both for my pacemaker and my heart.

Meanwhile I've been having fun going around doing the left-eye, right-eye game again, seeing how the eyes are currently different. Previously, the fixed eye saw white as white while the original one saw white as yellowish. Blues tended more towards greenish in the "bad" eye. Something funny and new showed up while wearing those eclipse glasses and looking at the sun. It's a perfect circle, right? But as the eclipse proceeded, one of the top points of the waning crescent the moon left began to pull in to the center, making the sun misshapen. Yeah, OK, whatever, I could ask the eye doc next visit. The camera got it right. That's the important thing.

When that visit rolled around, I had  multiple opportunities to view perfect circles on numerous charts and posters on their walls. Not only was that top slant still there, but a bottom one joined it. Circles had become ovals, as if pushed inwards between 12:00 and 3:00,  and again between 9:00 and 6:00. They tilted. Only with the unimproved eye of course. (BTW for those of you who don't understand that description, you're showing your lack of age and understanding of a non-digital clock face. Better fix that because some day when you get old some doctor is going to check how mentally impaired old age has left you when you can't read the arrows inside a circle without the numbers on them and tell your Doc what time it is!)

Other left-right self eye tests later had the tilts showing up in rectangles, like picture frames. I asked the doc was it weird? Did other people who came in have the same thing? He avoided commenting on weird, but had a name for the phenomenon: astigmatism. So that's what it is! I've heard it much of my life but nobody ever could explain what it meant in how it messed with your vision. Now I know! Well, one way at least.

The new lens will fix that too, of course. But we have to be careful with just how they put it in. Since I remembered from the first time that one eye had pseudoexfoliation, I made sure the doc checked this one for it as well. Yep. It's there. I can't tell, of course, since it's pretty microscopic. This time I got more information on it as well.  What it means is that tiny cells are flaking off the inside of the front of the eye. They tend to float around, not a problem... until they land in the back of the eye in the tiny openings that allow fluids to pass out the back of the eye, usually a normal process. If those get blocked, pressure builds up, and glaucoma results, leading to blindness. 

(Gee, here I only thought I needed to worry about inheriting the macular degeneration my Dad had!)

Apparently lots of us have it, and not so many manage to have it cause glaucoma. That's the semi-reassuring news. It does mean, by replacing the second lens sooner rather than not, the surgery now should be more successful than postponing it years down the road, as then the results may mean the lens won't stay seated properly. The result is I need to follow through on getting annual exams with that nasty little puff on the eyeball while one is not supposed to blink (Yeah, right, try that!) to test eye pressure. So far, so good however. 

I'm also supposed to remind the doc the day of surgery that he needs to remember that I have, in his words, "eye dandruff"! 

Hey everybody, I've got eye dandruff!

But don't worry folks. Next time I'm leaning over a plate of food for you, maybe a bit tired and rubbing my eyes, nothing is going to fall into your food. It's not eye-lash dandruff. Any flakes just head back into the deep dark recesses of my eyeballs. So I'm not sharing. You'll just have to grow your own.