lasik

yet another file of photos on my desktop i found that were never actually posted!

this would be the night before lasik day. 

felt like i should document the last night i would wear (prescription) glasses!

 so remember this post?

this is what happened that day.

my sweet dad agreed to tag along since i wouldn't be able to drive after.

this was the first time i had been in his new work van! 

we love vans!

i'm rarely embarrassed and i know there are worse things but i tried to keep this on the dl. 

 i had to wear clip on sunglasses!

 which really was the lowest blow of the whole wearing 

glasses for nine months and getting eye viruses fiasco i think.

SO SO glad i can say goodbye to those things. 

in case you have never had lasik this is how the whole thing goes down.

upon arrival i had to take a valium, take my shoes off,

 and put a really sweet hair cap/net thing on.

then they put multiple drops in my eyes to numb them

then she rubbed this awesome brown stuff all over my eyelids to make sure they were completely clean

then gave me cookies and had "jar of hearts" playing so i would be relaxed

(i guess this is a very stressful procedure for some people?)

after they know my eyes are numb and clean clean clean they 

began the first part of the procedure: the keratectomy

 (which is making a circular corneal flap on each eye with a laser)

they have to get your eye to be still so they place a type of suctioned ring on the eye to hold it in place. it kind of felt like a plunger was on my eye and even though it wasn't painful it was a rather odd sensation.

because they don't use blades, the laser just creates thousands of little air bubbles in my eye and you have to wait for them to dissipate until the flap can be pulled back so i just got to sit in a massage chair for twenty minutes and eat freshly baked cookies. it was awesome.

then i went back in for the second part which would be the actual lasik process.

they put saran wrap looking stuff over my eyelashes and then a clamp thing to keep my eye open. it sounds really awful but really you can't feel a thing! i was told to stare at a red light (or maybe it was green?) and try to hold still. within four seconds it was done and the flap was put back and the eye was done! then we moved on to the next eye. the whole thing took maybe ten minutes and it only smelled slightly of burning eye! not something you smell everyday haha.

then i was just sent out in the hall and told to keep my eyes shut. sometimes i accidentally opened them because there was the prettiest view through the window in front of me and it was the weirdest thing, it was clear and not blurry! modern technology rocks.

after sit in the hall with your eyes closed time each eye was checked to make sure the flap was placed correctly, then i was sent home with orders to sleep (because of the consumption of valium) and start using the prescription eye drops every few hours. 

i was also sent home with some wicked shades and a hoopes mug with candy in it and a packet of information to give to a friend haha. so if anyone is interested, i'm your girl.

after all that i went home and laid on our couch downstairs in the dark. 

at first it seemed okay but then it felt like this happened all over again.

(i just looked over that post and i think i really downplayed how much pain i was in with that virus. 

let's just say i have never been in more excruciating pain in my life)

as the numbing drops wore off my eyes began feeling like they were burning and they wouldn't stop watering. but i had to be careful to not touch them because there was just a flap on my cornea that needed to heal so that wasn't pleasant. 

but then sweet ryan came over to keep me company and i listened (with my eyes closed) to planet earth on dvd while he did some accounting homework. 

but every few minutes i would open my eyes (i can't not watch planet earth and just listen are you kidding me?) and it was so magical! i could see the animals perfectly! so then we watched my eye procedure (thank hoopes for taping that!) and he read me the scriptures (couldn't actually see up close for awhile, that was kind of stressful) and then after he left i tried sleeping but that whole valium makes you tired talk was crap and i couldn't fall asleep until 3 am. so i watched julie and julia with sunglasses on and the brightness of the tv down real low. haha it was awesome.

then, the next day i went in for a check up, then a few hours later drove down to provo and could see perfectly! i love miracles. 

then, the luckiest part (besides the fact that i no longer had to wear clip on sunglasses but could wear awesome ones again) was that my eyes were all good again for the mission reunion!

(which means that probably none of them even knew i had all that happen before 

and after the last one in october! funny.)