It was an hour of eye tests and four different kinds of drops before the Dr came in. He agreed that my new left eye was not functioning as well as expected and even could not be corrected to 20/20 with my new lens. That's the bad news.
Apparently I have “dry eye” . That's the good news. I treat for a month with warm compresses, then cold compresses, eye wash, lubricant drops and medicated ointment at night. My next appointment is January 13.
He said I will probably still need glasses even after next cataract is removed (maybe late March) unless I want laser surgery (not covered by insurance). His hope is to correct right eye to 20/30 then glasses rather than mess with the cataract free left eye again (which hopefully will also be 20/30).
Sooooo! I’ll keep myself on “no driving” until further notice. This will impact a lot of WLLO events (gingerbread day and WLLO Holiday party) as I was giving rides to people who needed them. And taking the boys shopping for their parents.
I am comfortable driving with one eye just to my local grocery (five blocks) or Starbucks ... with no one in the car. It makes me anxious to even be with others as I have to close one eye to do ANYTHING! Even with my current specs.
This stinks.
It does stink! One of my friends has a glass eye that she's had since childhood and she drives everywhere. I do think in time you'll be comfortable enough to drive again with practice and it's legal. But it probably takes more concentration so you're smart not to have the distractions in the car. Can't you get a pirate's patch? I couldn't keep one eye shut if my life depended on it.
ReplyDeleteI will get used to it but I have no depth perception. But it's possible. You just don't realize how often you USE something (bad knees) until you get them fixed.!
DeleteInteresting... I didn't know dry eye could change the shape of your eye. I have dry eyes and just use lubricant drops.
ReplyDeleteProbably JUST enough to change the surgery eye. Surgeon DID have me use drops 4x day before she measured the curvature ... so I'm surprised SHE didn't advise me to use drops for a few weeks to see if that helped.
DeleteMy eyes never felt dry!
Good news, this physician seems to know what he is doing. Bad news, no driving for more months! That would be frustrating and I don't even like to drive! That was interesting about the dry eye. I hadn't heard of it causing the shape of the eye ball to change. Here's hoping you get a good report when you return in January!
ReplyDeletebetty