From the Archives: The Thing With My Eye

This post first appeared on my old blog on December 24, 2018. It's hard to believe that it has been 10 years since I lost sight in my left eye and embarked on the journey toward a prosthetic replacement.

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It all started about 3 years ago. After a rare workout at our office gym, I experienced a central retinal vein occlusion. A retinal specialist attempted to treat it with a steroid shot into my eyeball which is awful and traumatic as it sounds. I pleaded with the guy not to do it. I'll tell you anything you need to know, I told him. I know the location of the rebel base. Maybe we can work out a deal. For a guy holding a needle, he had surprisingly low sense of humor.

The steroid didn't solve my problem. You see, my eye pressure was bonkers. A normal eye pressure reading is in the teens. Mine regularly spiked over 50. I don't know unit in which they measure eye pressure, but it's probably not part of the metric system. An ahmed tube was inserted in April of 2016. I was still blind, but the pressure was regulated. Other problems arose, though. Sensitivity to bright light (which is also related to me being part Mogwi) and a weakening eyelid made me self-conscious, as well as depth perception issues. I explored several options for eyewear:

My personal favorite

I tried to approach it all with self-deprecating humor, which is usually my coping mechanism. It's far easier to deal with something like this with jokes than self-pity. An eye patch seemed to be in my future, because the eye itself would sometimes narrow and become irritated. This actually seemed like a cool development and a looked to pop culture for inspiration. Time passed. I adjusted to a new normal. Mostly, I take my time doing things others take for granted, like driving or pouring a beverage into a glass.

Then, back in September, I noticed something had changed. Even though the Ahmed tube was doing its job, my eye was growing more and more irritated. I noticed more and more sagging and a bothersome tendency to be just a little off-center. In November, it got worse and when I visited my eye surgeon during my bi-annual check up, he informed me it was growing weaker and weaker. My eye was dying. He recommended something called an eye evisceration. I would receive a prosthetic eye to replace the dying one. Good times.

So, on December 10th, I underwent the evisceration and spent the rest of the week recovering. I became stir crazy. I discovered that Hallmark Christmas movies are much more interesting when watched while on hydrocodone. I tried to write, but was far too out of it. 

For the next few weeks, my eye will heal. Or, what's left of my eye. I have an eye ball covering a marble-sized insert. On January 31st, I will begin the first of three steps to setting me up with a prosthetic. It's not a bionic eye, although I'll probably call it that. I'm also working on a series of outlandish stories to explain how I lost my sight. I wish it was a bionic eye. Then, I'd be The Six Million Dollar Man. 

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to train of fight Sasquatch.