December 17th

 For those of you who do not know this, I am blind.  I know a lot of people say this but in my case it is true.  My vision does not correct to 20/20 even with contacts or glasses.  I have worn glasses since I was two years old, and contacts since I was thirteen.  I wear coke bottle glasses or gas permeable contacts all the time. Now that I am in my forties it is common for me to have my contacts in and wear my 2.0 reading glasses on top of them. I laugh at people who don't want to wear reading glasses because they think it makes them old.  I laugh because I know that lack of eye sight is not necessarily an age thing, but because they do not know how blessed they are to have the option of seeing well. 

When I was 10 years old I got the first pair of glasses that were truly hi

deous.  That circle that forms in the lens because of the nature of concave corrective lenses for myopia was truly pronounced.  Right when I was hitting puberty my glasses became even more unsightly. I was already bullied and called a nerd (which I was, but it had nothing to do with the glasses)an egghead, ugly, and everything else the cruel kids could muster up against a girl that was different in 6th grade. I used to fantasize about eye surgery. Someone magically calling up my house to say they found the miracle cure that would make less hideous. 

I am not telling this story for you to pity me.  I am saying it because I want to share how easy it is to internalize what you hear day in and day out.  My dad told me I was beautiful.  My big brother told me I was beautiful.  But I did not listen because the boys in the school would use me to make fun of other boys. "Oh yeah, well Lisa is your girlfriend!". Yeah.  Revenge was sweet though.  My dad was right and I was beautiful.  When I was thirteen and got my contacts for the first time... well, it changed my life. I was at the supermarket with my mom and when I got home I got a phone call from a good friend who had seen me from afar and was shocked at how beautiful I looked. She had known me since I was seven, but somehow never knew I was pretty until I was thirteen. 

You know that tired old story of the girl that walks around in glasses and gets a makeover and all of a sudden everyone thinks she is cool? That was me.  I left for Christmas break in the eighth grade one girl and came back in January a different girl.  I mean, I had teachers ask who the new girl was. Also, apparently boobs get camouflaged by glasses because the boys acted like I just got them with my contacts. A credit to my solid upbringing that I did not change who I was or who I hung out with.  At the ripe old age of fourteen I knew that if you did not like me before you did not deserve my time after. My best friends from school are the same girls that were there before and after. We still talk.

I counted the other day and I got up to 17 - the number of eye doctors that have evaluated me.  I have moved around a lot in my life and certainly that has a lot to do with it. But I am also a doctor snob and have tried different ones at different times. No one holds a candle to me beloved Dr. Hamed Santaella, who treated me from the age of 8 until I was 22. I went back to see him when I was pregnant with my first child to discuss with him the possibility of retinal detachment during labor. He was tickled to see me.  Call in his son who was taking over his service to introduce me to him.  So proud of having an old patient he watched grow up come back for his professional opinion 15 years later. His son inherited his dad's telenovela good looks, by the way.

When I was twenty three I had a doctor offer surgery.  He wanted to do cataracts surgery on me, as research had shown that for myopic patients it could diminish the defect. I went to Dr. Santaella for advise then. He said he thought I was too young to have a surgery that was typically performed on people in the sixties. He said I was a special case and I should beware of doctors seeking a trophy to put on the shelf. You can see why I love him.

Many doctors since then have mentioned this surgery to me. They all say the same thing:     "Maybe when you are older". My current doctor mentioned it to me again this year.  He said I was a little on the young side, but he wanted to refer me to a clinic in Atlanta that was very reputable and  if anyone could help me they could.  So I did.

It is called The Woolfson Clinic and the specialist I saw was Dr. Brody.  Having recently binged Homeland I had misgivings trusting a Brody but I moved forward anyway. Michael had never been to the eye doctor with me and was a little amused.  They were appropriately shocked at my eyes.  The technician that helped me at first was not sure his machine was correct when it read my eye glasses at -24 and -26, he did not know they made prescriptions that high.  The highest he had seen was a -20. 

Dr. Brody was appropriately reluctant. He said he had done this surgery 13,000 times but the highest he had corrected was about a -19.  He was concerned with the risks to my retina. And he refused to really move forward until the retinal specialist, Dr. Leff evaluated me and gave him the green light.  I liked what  I saw.  I felt they were being responsible, so we scheduled a visit with Dr. Leff.  Dr. Leff was cautiously optimistic.  he warned that there were many risks and that with my condition being so extreme the risks were certainly higher.  There is always a risk of retinal detachment. Of course, he would be there to reattach if needed, but as I am well aware the window to reattach is small. However, his opinion was that my retina was stable enough to go through a surgery.

These two visits were odd.  We left the clinic thinking it is probably not going to happen.  I was even borderline offended because Dr. Brody said something to the effect of he was not sure it was worth it, since he thought the best he could do was bring me to a -6 or -5. He is used to correcting someone's eyes, not just improving them.  Here is the metaphor I came up with: it felt like I was homeless person trying to get shelter, but the person building the shelter only builds mansions. Maybe you should continue to be homeless, you know, because your used to it.  I am not sure I can build you a small ranch. 

The day of my follow up came and we went almost expecting to hear come back in five years or something. Much to our surprise, they were picking dates for surgery.  After many tests and conversations we met with Dr. Brody again. He was all for it.  He was still researching lenses to put in my eyes but he was hoping to get me to -4! or maybe even less! He can't promise anything, but he was sure going to try. He seemed confident he could do it and do it well, after consulting with Dr. Leff.  We were shocked but pleased.

So here is the plan. On December 3rd  I am currently scheduled to have cataracts surgery.  It is an intraocular lens replacement.  A lot of people have this surgery because the lens inside their eye gets cloudy. It is removed and people go about their business.  In my case they will replace the lens with a monofocal corrective lens.  Just removing the lens would improve my eye sight by at least 5 points.  The problem is my eyes are so myopic that there is no lens that would correct my vision to 20/20, the best they can do is insert a lens that will get me to maybe a 20/50? 20/75?  We really do not know.  All we know is we are going to try it, and we are starting with the worst eye just in case something goes wrong.  My good eye currently correct in contacts to 20/35, so it is precious.  The bad eye? I don't even know! 20/100 with lenses?  

The standard operating procedure is to operate on the right eye, wait a few days for it to heal and then operate the left.  In my case, we will start on the right (which is the bad one) and then wait two weeks to do the other one.  They want to make sure there are no serious complications before trying it on my precious eye... you know, the one that is -24. This presents some challenges though.  For one thing my eyes will not correct to 20/20, but my current glasses will be too strong.  So, I guess we try to pop out the lens in my glasses on just one side, and I deal with the lopsided effect of this for 2 weeks.  Then if all goes well, on December 17th I get surgery on my left eye and maybe I see way better than before without any lenses...but I may still have a -4 or a -6?  Let's assume they shave off 20 out of each eye, that leaves me with a -4 in one eye and a -6 in the other.  Michael wears -6 glasses, maybe I can wear his while I get my own?  

Anyway, that's what happening in my life.  Assuming we don't collapse under the weight of COVID 19 in the next few weeks.  These are ambulatory surgeries so one can hope they are insulated in the eye clinic from some of this.  However, my kids' school just closed for 2 weeks because too many staff members are sick or quarantined so you never know.  All I can say is I have to be hopeful that something good will come out of 2020, even if it won't be 20/20 for me, I will take the shack after being homeless for so long.  

One more thing: You know when I got my contacts for the first time? December 17th 1986. 2020 has been a very unlucky year but 12/17 may be my lucky day.