Eye

[xt1me]

I had to get my eye scraped yesterday and it was exactly how it sounds.
Thank God for anaesthetic.



Years and years ago I had an issue with my right eye were it soddenly go really itchy. I mean mind-boggling itchy.
To this day I don't know why.
Obviously I didn't scratch it because I knew something was wrong, so I when to an optician ask for some advise. (i figured song to Specsavers would be cheaper then going to my GP and they'd probably know more anyway.
Sure enough, they gave some ointment/eye drop thing and after a couple of weeks I was fine.
Turns out I had a small hole in my cornea, but since the ointment worked I didn't worry about it.

Fast forward to last year.
It wasn't anything like the immense itchiness I remembered from years ago. It was more like I had a hard piece of sleep still in my eye but it wasn't going away.
I went to a pharmacy and they said it sounded like dry eye and gave me some eye drops.

But it didn't go away.

I figured it might be something more when one time I work up and when I tried to open my eye it felt like the eye lid was stuck to my eye for a moment.

So I went to an optometrist again and they did took a look. They gave me some different eye drops and referred me to a specialist.

(I don't like specialists. The last one I went to immediately wanted me to have surgery that would have me out of action for months & when I got a 2nd opinion, from the free health clinic attached to my insurance, I just had to do some stretches.
The specialist before that, for a different issue, had me on a load of different ointments that didn't do anything & I eventually gave up. That issue went away on it's own.)

This specialist was an eye surgeon and they took a look, dilated my eye and took some photos. Turns out the top lay of skin on my eye was loose and it was causing irritation. He could see the old damaged area and thought that had just gotten week.
He gave some more of the eye drops I got from the optician and told me to get some ointment from the pharmacist (over the counter stuff so I didn't need prescription) and use them for 6 months even if it started to feel better. If it didn't clear up after 6 months then I might needed surgery.

The drops & ointment did help a bit but the issue didn't clear up.

The 6 months ended December last year so I made an appointment after New Year.
He had a look and told me he would have to remove the loose skin and give my eye a chance to heal up properly.
So I booked an appointment for the procedure for yesterday.

(I don't know if I can call it surgery since I wasn't put under and technically wasn't cut into. But it wasn't exactly nothing.)

He literally scraped my eye with a stick (probably a sterile cotton ball or something, It's not like I could see it from that close) while I had to stare into a light with a dilated pupil.
Thankfully he had something to keep my eye open because there was no way I would have been able to stop from blinking otherwise.
The anaesthetic was fantastic, I couldn't feel a thing except for a bit of pressure from the back of my eye when it was pushed into my skull. Which was really weird.
He also had to simulate growth on the troubled bit. By which I mean he poked my eye with a tiny needle so my skin would have a surface to adhere to when it grew back.

Hopefully this procedure fixes the issue. There is a small chance that when my eye heals back it might still be loos in which case the next procedure uses a laser to strip my cornea evenly and might effect my prescription. Fingers crossed I don't need it.

Healing is going to take a while. I got antibiotic eye-drops I need to take for the next 4 months. The doctor put in a contact lens to keep my eye separate from my eyelid as it heals. It's a kind of contact were I need to go back to the Dr to change after 2 weeks and removed after 4.
It should probably take about 2 months to fully heal and we'll see after that.

In the mean time I'm probably be in pain the until tomorrow.
I got given codeine (since I can't take anti-inflammatories because I had an ulcer) as well as the same anaesthetic eye drops that was used in the procedure.

I tried to stick it out and not take the codeine but paracetamol did nothing. Thankfully I was able to go to sleep fine so hopefully the pain goes away soon.

I will say that I didn't realise how much pain I was in until I caved and used the anaesthetic drop and got immediate relief.
The pain is weird too. It's not like a cut or a bruise. It does sting or burn or ache and it's not itchy. But the difference before and after the anaesthetic is pretty dramatic.

Also, it turns out when your eye is hurt it starts watering like crazy. Probably to get rid of irritants, which of course it cant. And just like any time you cry, watering eyes make your nose start running.

I did not expect going though a box of tissues to be one of the side effects of this.

Nothing I can do now except heal up.
Fingers crossed it'll be fast and complete.