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I've been debating whether to post my tale of woe on this site for some time because my story seems like one that's been told here before. But then I decided that if one person reads it and decides to think twice about lasik, it's done some good. So here goes.
I'm a 51-year-old woman who lives in the Northwest. I have had terrible vision since the fourth grade. My pre-lasik numbers were -9.5 in both eyes. I have always fiddled with contacts and glasses, and when the stories about lasik started to come out, I was excited by the prospect of being able to throw all that away and see like a normal person. Everyone I talked to raved about the procedure.
Of course now I wish I had done my homework. I had very bad vision, big pupils and what I now know were dry eyes -- every contraindication for having the operation. Yet there wasn't a peep from my doctor and we plowed ahead.
I wanted to go to the best guy in town, so I went to my general practitioner's surgeon, plunked down the $4,000 and looked forward to my new life. Had I only known.
I began having trouble right away. I had terrible contrast problems. Seeing in dim light now is a nightmare. I have halos, starbursts, glare and light sensitivity. My eyes are so dry that I sometimes have to wake up three and four times a night to put drops in them. I also developed terrible floaters about a year ago to add to the mess.
My doctor was terrible. I think I was part of his learning curve -- he'd only done 1,000 eyes and said he'd never seen dry eye before as a result of lasik. He suggested that my problem was a hormonal and put me on birth control pills, which didn't help one bit. He then put lower punctal plugs in both eyes and when the right one fell out, we cauterized it. These procedures helped a little, but not enough. Thank god I live in the damp northwest. I can't imagine what my eyes would be like if I lived in dry state like New Mexico. To top it off, my doctor began to tell me that this problem was all in my head -- even though we did a shirmer's test to determine the numbers. I stormed out of his office when he suggested that I was the problem and have never been back. I've been to two other opthamologists in town who tell me my eyes look fine because I can see the snellen chart. Thanks guys!
I am indebted to this site and the people on it for their courage and good cheer. I've tried many of your suggestions. I use fish oil, borage oil, flaxseed oil and evening primrose oil for my dry eye symptoms (my blood probably looks like motor oil at this point.) I tried restasis but it burned terribly and left my eyes photosensitive. I use hot showers, eye drops, and occasional lid scrubs, although the scrubs don't seem to help much. As you all do, I have my good days and bad.
I can still drive to and from my job 3 miles from home (I work evenings at a newspaper and am on a computer for at least 40 hours a week.) I don't yet need the pentoptix glasses. But there are things I'll never do because of this condition: drive more than a few miles at night, move to a dry state, go anywhere without my eyedrops, shop in a dimly lit store and know what I'm looking at. To top it off, I still use glasses for everything. I had monovision, and my left eye got worse, necessitating my wearing glass for distance. I use computer glasses at work. Lasik has bee the worst thing that every happened to me. Think twice before you get it done, because there's no cure for the problems I've got.
I'm a 51-year-old woman who lives in the Northwest. I have had terrible vision since the fourth grade. My pre-lasik numbers were -9.5 in both eyes. I have always fiddled with contacts and glasses, and when the stories about lasik started to come out, I was excited by the prospect of being able to throw all that away and see like a normal person. Everyone I talked to raved about the procedure.
Of course now I wish I had done my homework. I had very bad vision, big pupils and what I now know were dry eyes -- every contraindication for having the operation. Yet there wasn't a peep from my doctor and we plowed ahead.
I wanted to go to the best guy in town, so I went to my general practitioner's surgeon, plunked down the $4,000 and looked forward to my new life. Had I only known.
I began having trouble right away. I had terrible contrast problems. Seeing in dim light now is a nightmare. I have halos, starbursts, glare and light sensitivity. My eyes are so dry that I sometimes have to wake up three and four times a night to put drops in them. I also developed terrible floaters about a year ago to add to the mess.
My doctor was terrible. I think I was part of his learning curve -- he'd only done 1,000 eyes and said he'd never seen dry eye before as a result of lasik. He suggested that my problem was a hormonal and put me on birth control pills, which didn't help one bit. He then put lower punctal plugs in both eyes and when the right one fell out, we cauterized it. These procedures helped a little, but not enough. Thank god I live in the damp northwest. I can't imagine what my eyes would be like if I lived in dry state like New Mexico. To top it off, my doctor began to tell me that this problem was all in my head -- even though we did a shirmer's test to determine the numbers. I stormed out of his office when he suggested that I was the problem and have never been back. I've been to two other opthamologists in town who tell me my eyes look fine because I can see the snellen chart. Thanks guys!
I am indebted to this site and the people on it for their courage and good cheer. I've tried many of your suggestions. I use fish oil, borage oil, flaxseed oil and evening primrose oil for my dry eye symptoms (my blood probably looks like motor oil at this point.) I tried restasis but it burned terribly and left my eyes photosensitive. I use hot showers, eye drops, and occasional lid scrubs, although the scrubs don't seem to help much. As you all do, I have my good days and bad.
I can still drive to and from my job 3 miles from home (I work evenings at a newspaper and am on a computer for at least 40 hours a week.) I don't yet need the pentoptix glasses. But there are things I'll never do because of this condition: drive more than a few miles at night, move to a dry state, go anywhere without my eyedrops, shop in a dimly lit store and know what I'm looking at. To top it off, I still use glasses for everything. I had monovision, and my left eye got worse, necessitating my wearing glass for distance. I use computer glasses at work. Lasik has bee the worst thing that every happened to me. Think twice before you get it done, because there's no cure for the problems I've got.
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