After I left the lasik place, I spent a couple of hours sitting in my car. I was a little irritated. I was perfectly okay to drive myself home, but I couldn't do that because I hadn't been able to contact OddlyFamiliarGirl. She ended up getting my messages right as she was pulling into the parking lot.

So that sucked.

After an hour or so, right about when OddlyFamiliarGirl got to my house, the numbing drops started to wear off. There was no pain, though. I felt like there was an eyelash stuck in my eye. That's really the most discomfort I ever felt in my eye throughout this entire process.

I was really glad they'd given me those sunglasses. The urge to rub my eye was extremely strong. That urge stayed with me for several days, so I wore the sunglasses for several days, and nights.

Yes, I was supposed to sleep in the things for at least a week. I didn't make it that long.

Back to Day Zero...

My plan had been to go to sleep. That had been what the lasik doctor had advised, and I was definitely very tired.

But nooooooooooooooo...

Dozens of tornado warnings started sounding. On TV, they were going crazy, basically saying that there were tornadoes heading towards both of my sisters' houses, and maybe even one heading toward my house.

That's when I lost power.

So, instead of getting to sleep, I drove to Korner Pub, where they still had power, and watched their TV for about six hours. Eventually some dude came in and said that power on my road was back on, so I went home and finally went to bed.

By the end of that first day, My eye was pretty itchy. I kinda wished I'd had some pain medication around, or a sleeping pill, but I didn't. between the itchy eye and those damn sunglasses, I didn't get to sleep for several more hours, and even then I don't think I slept very soundly.

On that day, I really didn't pay much attention to how well I could see. What little attention I did pay showed pretty much was I was expecting. My eye was still messed up and so my vision was worse than it had been before. Like I said, I was expecting this so it didn't bother me.

Day One...

The first full day after my surgery began with my driving back out to Joffe for a follow-up appointment. It didn't last very long at all. The doctor looked at my eye and had me read from an eye chart. Things were still quite blurry, but definitely better than my left (untreated) eye at seeing distant objects.

Also, later that day, I shot my first games of pool since the procedure. Both at home, and later at stupid Jack's, I noticed that my alignment was way off on most shots. It seemed that my left and right eyes were having an argument as to which direction to shoot. The result of this argument was that I didn't shoot particularly well. This didn't bother me. I knew it would take a while for things to stabilize.

Day Two...

The Sunday after the procedure. The itchiness in my eye was gone. Really the only time I felt any discomfort was when I put in the medicated drops that the doctor had prescribed. They burned a little, and as an added bonus they made my vision very blurry for about an hour.

Plus, trying to sleep with those sunglasses was killing me. I stopped wearing them to bed Sunday night.

Day Four...

Seeing much better, as evidenced by a pretty good pool session at stupid Jack's. My eyes seemed to have settled their little argument. In other words, my brain had learned how to interpret the new data it was getting.

I still wasn't seeing as well as I'd been hoping. Looking through my untreated eye with my old glasses, I saw extremely sharp edges on everything, with no sign of astigmatism. Looking at the same things with my treated eye, everything was still fuzzy and distorted.

Day Five...

Seeing a definite ghost image, just above the real image of whatever I was looking at. Like, I looked at a 5-ball on a pool table, and I saw what looked like a 3-ball directly behind it. Both the real ball and the ghost ball were very sharp, though.

Day Seven...

My one-week checkup at Joffe. I woke up with terrible vision. Worst than it had ever been. I started to freak out a little, thinking that this "improvement" was nowhere worth the money and time I'd put into it.

The one-week checkup went about like this:

Doctor: Good morning, David. How's the eye this morning?

Me: I can't see. And who said that?

(Doctor looks at my eye for a while.)

Doctor: Well it looks like everything is healing nicely. What's the smallest line you can read on chart?

Me: What fucking chart? And who said that?

Doctor: You can't read anything?

Me: I already said I can't even see, so no, I can't read.

Doctor: You know, most of the people I see after one week have worse vision than they did after one day.

Me: Seriously? That might have been a good thing to tell me ahead of time. Or put on the cheat sheet you gave me. It would have stopped me from freaking out.

Doctor: Well, it doesn't happen to everyone. But from today on, your vision should continue to improve. This should be the worst day.

Anyway...

I asked if there was anything I could do to make sure the healing went smoothly. The doctor said to just keep putting in my drops, don't go swimming, don't rub my eye, stuff like that. She said that I should start to see vast improvements soon.

I asked her if, once the healing was finished, if I'd be able to see as well as I'd been able to see wearing my glasses. Sharp edges and stuff. She said I probably could, we'd just have to wait and see.

Day Thirteen...

Tomorrow it will be two weeks. I will definitely say that things have improved drastically since last Friday. The itchiness is completely gone, and with it the urge to rub my eye. I no longer have to use the medicated drops, though I'm still using a lot of regular artificial tears. I'm pretty much drowning my eye in those things, not because of any problems, but to help ensure that there aren't any problems.

My distance vision still isn't as good as I want it to be, but it's certainly very good. The healing, even if it stops right now, will be good enough to make this entire experience worth it to me.