Back in the Saddle

The retina reattachment was successful. But what an experience it was.

The surgery was at 9:30 Thursday morning, and it was similar to the cataract surgery I had a few months ago, to this extent: they put me under for a few minutes to block the nerves around the eye, then they woke me up for the surgery. I was wide awake throughout the cataract surgery, but for this one, I kept nodding off, and the doctor kept telling me to try to stay awake. I guess it didn’t occur to him to slow down the anesthetic drip, and try as I might, I could not stay awake.

They put a patch on my eye, gave me some medicine and instructions, and I was sent home.

The first recovery phase of surgery like this begins when the anesthetic wears off. The whole right side of my head was numb when I got home, but within a few hours it began to wear off. That’s when I needed to start taking the medicine. The area around, and particularly behind, my eye hurt like hell that day and the next, but within a couple days, the pain was manageable.

Midday Friday I went back to the Eye Center to have the patch taken off. The doctor looked at the eye and declared the reattachment a success. He gave me 3 different types of eye drops and sent me home. My instructions were to lie on my left side as much as possible, but I could also lie with my face down or I could sit upright. I could not lie on my right side or my back, and I could not look up. I was specifically told not to sit in a recliner. The purpose of all this was to keep the gas bubble properly positioned within my eye.

When I got home, I got the first look at myself since the surgery, and it was not a pretty sight. My pupil was completely dilated, so there was no color to the eye. The area around my eye was swollen, and the white of my eye was a bright red. I also had a cat’s-eye kind of appearance, probably due to reflection from the gas bubble they injected into my eyeball. As for vision, all was a blur.

By Saturday morning I had noticed a change. I could see a small horizontal line near the upper limit of my vision, and as I tilted my head, the line stayed horizontal. This was from the fluids that were replacing the gas bubble in my eye. I was beginning to feel like Steve Austin – I had a bionic eye with a built-in level. Imagine how easy it would be to read greens with this level – if only I could see the greens.

By Sunday, a bit of the color had returned to the pupil, and the swelling had gone down. I noticed that when I looked straight down, it was like looking through a few inches of water. If I moved at all, the image would move until the fluid settled. But it was still all a blur.

On Monday, I noticed that the horizontal line had moved down a bit. This confused me because I assumed the line would move up as fluid filled the eye – until I remembered that the eye sees everything upside down and backwards. The other thing about Monday was the realization that lying on one side for extended periods is not much fun. More than once I woke up lying on my back, and I immediately turned over to my left side.

Tuesday was uneventful other than I could see that the horizontal line had dropped a bit more. I could make out images above the line, but not very well.

Wednesday was a good day in at least one respect. The horizontal line was noticeably lower on Wednesday morning than it was Tuesday might, and by Wednesday evening it was lower still. I was beginning to see things above the line, and even though the vision wasn’t clear, I could make things out. The downside was that the line was now right in the middle of my field of view, and it drove me nuts. Also, the sensation of looking at everything though water was disorienting. This is very hard to describe, but it is not very comfortable.

Thursday’s milestone was when I looked straight down at something. Although I was still looking through that water, there was now a ring around it. That told me that the gas bubble was shrinking.

It took another week for the bubble to disappear. As the days passed, the circle I saw when I looked down got smaller and smaller, and on the 14th day, it was gone. I don't think that means the gas is gone...it just means I can no longer see it. They told me I couldn't fly until mid-summer because of the gas in my eye.

As I write this, it has been 15 days since the surgery. Anyone would be able to see that my eye has been through some kind of trauma, and the vision remains very blurry. I’m told that it could take several months for my vision to get back to normal, and the eye still itches. But things are looking up (pun intended) and I will return to work on Monday.


Day two and day eleven....