burning of the eyes with lasers
I’m nearsighted. My vision corrects to 20/20 with glasses, but without them I’m a mess. Up close I can see fine; but put anything further than six inches from my face and I’m blind. I have trouble explaining how bad my vision is, so a couple weeks ago, at the Greenbelt, I did an experiment. I took a picture, deliberately out of focus, then took off my glasses and compared. After some trial and error, I can say that my uncorrected vision looks something like this:
(but with slightly uglier bokeh, probably owing to my astigmatism.)
Anyway, tomorrow (Tuesday) at 11:30 AM I’m undergoing PRK surgery, also known as the burning of the eyes with lasers, to try and fix my vision. In advance of the thing I’ve been prescribed both narcotic and non-narcotic pain relievers, including 2,400 mg of Ibuprofen daily — the over-the-counter dose is 200 mg — so I’m assuming it’ll be at least marginally painful. But seeing as we’re living in such uncertain times, and I have the money saved up, I figure it’s wise to get it over with now.
I probably won’t be shooting much in the next couple of weeks, and recovery could take a full month or more, although I’m certainly hoping to hit the lower end of that window. In the meantime, I’m going to try to document my recovery on my Twitter feed, and from time to time I may bring the camera to my face; take a picture, out of focus; and compare.
