“lasers”

So, I’ve decided to get laser eye surgery. That’s right. “Laser.” Combined with the spam I got this week for “Plexus – the male enlarger”, you can soon expect to see me making my bid for world domination as a laser-beam-shooting giant.

(A REALLY long explanation of my reasons, what happens, and what has happened to me so far follows. A really good explanation (with jokes!) of laser eye surgery can be found here.)

This decision didn’t come lightly. I did a report a few years ago (well, I guess it was about six now. Six? Wha..?) on eyes or eye surgery or some other eye-related topic that was of interest to me and few others, and did a section on corrective surgery. Being the late 90s, laser eye surgery was generally unavailable, mostly due to cost – it was still relatively new and very pricey. Well, at least, LASIK was. LASIK is the most common method used today – it’s quick, painless, and quick to heal. The much more common method of the time was RK (radial keratectomy) and PRK (photoreflective RK). Essentially, these two reshape the top layer of cornea using radial cuts and, in the case of PRK, a laser (LASIK reshapes the underlying layer).

OK, enough exciting science. Anyway, I found stories that talked about dry eyes, vision damage – the whole gamut. Enough that I resolved that it wasn’t worth it. After all, I didn’t mind blurriness – as a friend’s grandmother once said, “Everyone’s more beautiful when I don’t have my glasses on.” I can’t drive or see far without my glasses, but I can still navigate around my house, even go out for a walk to the store if I want.

However, I found that glasses restrict me in two ways that will come up again and again in my future: travel and photography. I don’t like having to always be concerned about my glasses when I go to sleep, and glasses make photography…more difficult. There’s nothing more annoying to me in photography than trying to make sure you’re getting the shot you want and having your glasses bump into the viewfinder. Contacts? Yeah, I had them, but they’re even more of a hassle, and living in a city with so much shit in the air, they get REALLY irritating REALLY fast.

As with everything, there is a balance: it’s generally common knowledge that the biggest complaint is reduced night vision, ranging from starring of lights to halos to almost being blind at night. A small percentage experience permanent damage. No one knows the real long-term effects or the effects of old age, as the surgery has only been available in the US for less than ten years. Complaints are up, though I think that’s for other reasons: more people using it means more complaints, and many people have unrealistic expectations of the surgery, taking it as a cure-all, 100% guaranteed. These issues are present, believe me. I don’t think my expectations are unrealistic – I’ve done my research, talked with those who’ve had it, and formed my own opinions.

Part of this will be a log so that others can know what to expect. I’ve talked to a few people out here, but had a bunch of questions that they couldn’t answer. You’d think people would ask everything about their eyes. Anyway, a number of friends are hinging their choice on my experience, so I wanted to document it, though it’s pretty easy these days.

First of all, there are two kinds of surgery you can get. There’s the basic whatever-whatever surgery, which’ll get you to 20/20 vision, or close enough that you don’t need glasses – the ‘basic’ package. They do also have an, um, ‘extended’ package (I guess), in which they use a different machine to not only perfect your vision, but also to perfect your whole cornea. From what I understood, our eyes are not perfect for light refraction, you can get them topped up so that not only will you be able to see things without glasses, but you will see them with absolutely perfect clarity. Possibly even better than people with naturally good vision. It, of course, comes at a cost – about 70% more than the cost of the original surgery (about $700CDN). This cost, upon consideration, was not worth it for me. It would be nice, but I’ve made it 25 years with half-decent eyeballs, I’m sure they’ll continue to serve me in a decent manner.

You start out with an exhaustive, and exhausting, two-hour check-up of your eyes. Forget all your trips to the eye doctor, they do everything here. The balloon, the Japanese mountain – I saw all the pictures. Twenty-five minutes of “Which is more clear – left or right?” (luckily, they speak decent English there, though, funny enough, I had recently studied the words in Chinese for “clear” , “not clear”, and “a little bit more/less”). Tear duct tests. A cornea thickness test where they actually touch each eyeball multiple times with some device. If you’re one of those people who hates seeing eyes touched, you’ll hate this part. Then they dilated my pupils and did most of the tests again. Dilated pupils really mess up your vision – you only get one focus. Glasses on: far. Glasses off: close. No mixing allowed.* It really was exhausting, and I get to do it all again before the surgery.

There were a few issues that one must remember, too. No swimming for a month – with the possibility of an infection in my eye, I’ll be staying clear. No washing your face for the same reason, at least, not in a splishy-splashy kind of way. Wipe downs only. Flying is allowed right after for LASIK, but not for a bit with PRK, as PRK is changing the shape of the eyeball, and the pressure change can undo some of the work. Sunglasses are required when you go outside for one month until your eye has adjusted to the change in light.

And that’s that. The surgery itself takes about 15 minutes, preceded by the two hour exam. I’ll even be enjoying the day I get it and the next day off, as it were, which’ll be nice. Oh, and one last thing, mostly so I remember and others know: they’re burning you with a laser. Many people report a headache after they’re finished, and it’s because they’re dehydrated – your eyes are working overtime to try and fix themselves and keep themselves wet, so drinking a lot of water is a very good idea.

I’m excited. I’ll let you know how it goes. Keep your eyes on the news.

*Which made me look like an old man, counting my change at the end of my outstretched arm and peering at students’ books over my glasses. I tell ya…