I Can See!!!

I'm not blind...thank goodness. =)

Here is my attempt to describe to you the process that occured when I went to go visit Orlando's leading lasik specialists, Dr. Filutowski and Dempsey.

We walk in, and to tell you the truth, I wasn't nervous, just a little carsick due to the fact that I was filling out some paperwork on the car ride over and complicated the matter by taking a bit out of the bf's veggie whopper.

Anyways, so we get there, and I sign in. Two minutes later this man comes to get me and introduces himself as Orlando's best masseuse. Apparently, Orlando has voted him best masseuse at some point in time, and he comes in and gives a short massage to patients before their procedures. COOL!

So I go sit down and watch all these people filling out their forms and wondering why they haven't called me up yet since, of course, I was on time, and a little early, actually!

This lady comes and sits down next to me and two seconds later, this older nurse lady comes out and calls "Valerie Villar?"

To which I stand up. Of course I'm wondering what the heck is going on since I didn't register, pay, get my bag o' Filutowski goodies (coffee cup, sleeping pill, sunglasses, eye drops, etc.). Then the lady behind the desk looks up and says, "no, not her, the OTHER one." To which we both look at each other thinking...oh CRAP! They have us confused! I'm going to walk away with this lady's eye perscription lasered on!

Long story short, while I was getting my five minute massage, the front desk lady had called me up to register for my appointment, by calling out "Valerie," to which the OTHER lady answered to since her name was also Valerie, although her appointment was for AFTER me. In addition, we both had the same perscription and everything. FREAKY!

So, I had to wait longer while all these people were getting their procedures done. There was a room full of people when I got there, and when I was done, there wasn't anyone left in the waiting area. In the mean time, I was able to watch from the viewing room the live video up on monitors showing each eye surgery. Very "Learning Channel"-ish.

When I finally get called, I grab my hair net (in the bag o' stuff) and leave my really cute eyeglasses. They bring me back to a separate room and sit me down. Since it is Friday, the two main doctors are tag teaming. Dr. Dempsey, a female, very soft spoken and relaxing, puts me under some machine. Good thing I'm practically blind without my glasses because I'm seeing lots of blurry stuff.

She has me looking at blinking lights and puts this thing around my eyeball that prohibits my blinking. She then tells me that I will be feeling some pressure on my eye - which I do. This whole time she's speaking to me with this really soothing voice...like one of those relaxation tapes..."You're doing fine...almost halfway done...we're done...you did wonderful." After the pressure, she tells me that the laser is starting to work to cut the flap on my eye. I could feel little tiny-tiny touches on my eye that sting just a little tiny bit for a 1/2 a second each. She does that for both eyes than moves me away from the machine.

At this moment, even if I wanted to open my eyes, I couldn't will my eyes to open. She tells me that now that the flap is made, there are air bubbles under there that prohibit me from seeing. So I lay there and then feel the touch of the nurses who lead me to another room. I hear voices in a hallway, I stand a little bit and then led to another room where they lay me down. This room, from what I saw afterwards, is the actual room that the doctor works his magic in correcting the vision. He had two machines in there so he can work on one person on one while the next person is laid down and waiting for him in the other.

I am glad I was able to rest a little bit between the cutting of the flap and the actual procedure and kind of calm down...not that I really needed much calming down. Oh, didn't I mention that they offered a valium to any patient that wanted one? I totally popped that pill. =)

When it was my turn, I couldn't see anything. I heard the doctor come over to my machine and sit down. He was a pretty soft-spoken man, so I think I wasn't really listening to him as well as I should of. They covered my left eye and so he started in on my right eye. I couldn't really see much, but from what I saw he did on other patients, he opened the flap that was made with a little tool. He told me to look at the flashing red light. THAT'S what I didn't really understand him telling me. Normally I'm a really good patient! Needless to say, I NOTICED the flashing red light, but I didn't really concentrate on it very well. I guess that affected things because he couldn't really get a read on my eye and decided to put that flap back and try on the left.

This would've been little nerve-wracking...if I wasn't all "whatever..." due to the valium.

So the left eye started, and I actually noticed he wanted me to keep looking at the blinking red light...so I figured I should. I looked and then I heard little clicking noises. I don't know what the laser did, but it didn't hurt any. When that was done, he had another tool with a little wipey thing on the end. He closed the flap and sort of smoothed my eye down. It did sort of look like someone was washing windows on my eyes. He put more drops in my eyes and then did the same for the right eye which went well (now that I was looking at the ever blinking light).

He moved me away from the maching, sat me up, took off my hair net, wiped my eyes, turned me to the nurse and said, "smile for the camera!" We both made a thumbs up motion and that was it!

They led me to another room where someone looked at my eyes really quick. Afterwards, the nurse went to go get my developed picture and some other nurse guy walked by, said hello, looked at me and said, "you have a red eye...don't put visine in." Thanks, dude!

I went home, put some drops in, took the sleeping pill and slept all night.

And this morning, after taking off the eyeshields and wiping my eyes...I can now say that I am able to see without my contacts or glasses!!!!! =)

I'll be healing for a bit, but I'm able to get on with life for the moment. No swimming or boxing or anything, but the bf was surprised that it was an outpatient type of thing.

So, folks, that's my story...for now. =)

Hope to see you all soon!!!

=)