Cataracts
Yesterday I had cataract surgery. I've had cataract surgery before, a couple of years ago when an aggressive cataract formed in the space of 3 weeks and sent me completely blind in that eye (I astounded a colleague by turning on the torch on my phone and holding it about 1 cm from my eye - all I could see was a mild glow). That surgery was ok, I guess. I had anaesthetic that blocked my optic nerve and a sticky cloth covered my face, so I saw nothing of the procedure.
This time was different. I had numerous numbing and dilating drops put in and I lay on the theatre bed waiting for the darkness to kick in, but that didn't happen.
Instead, a clamp was placed on my lids to keep them open, liquid was squirted into my eye as the surgeon began to work - he patiently explained what he was doing as he went along. All I could see was the light above me distorting as he worked. Initially I was fairly calm about it, but after a while a panic slowly started to rise up in me.
I knew that leaping off the table and legging it wasn't an option. Neither was asking for a break so I could collect my marbles. Suddenly I could feel my hands clenched too firmly against each other and noticed my legs were painfully stiffened, so I made a conscious effort to relax myself and regulate my breathing, concentrating on Uptown Girl playing on the theatre stereo, envisaging an oil stained Billy Joel singing into a giant spanner (or wrench as he would call it).
The procedure must have taken 15 minutes in total and I was soon back in the waiting room. About half an hour later I was discharged with my meds and a handful of biscuits that the NHS couldn't give away (you got a cuppa and biscuits after the procedure, apparently nobody likes the shortbreads with raisins, they had a box full and told me to take some).
Outside it was bright sunshine. My eye, covered with just a translucent guard, instinctively closed and a bolt of pain shot through it. I waited for my lift in the shade of a tree, which kind of helped. I spent the journey home with one eye open, feeling a bit sorry for myself.
Back home, I collapsed on the sofa and slept for 4 hours. When I woke up I felt kind of traumatised.
I've had procedures under local anaesthetic before, but not up close and personal in my face. I went in feeling cocky because I thought I knew what was going to happen; lie back, cloth on face, drops in eyes, go blind, surgery happens, feel nothing, hear the surgeon and technicians taking amd the equipment humming, done, out, biscuits and tea and home.
Instead I got instruments in my face and the view of things being taken out and put in my eye.
It's a peculiar feeling; I wanted and needed the procedure; hell, I signed up for it, but whilst it was happening - and for a while afterwards - it felt like I had beenw attacked, violated even.
Maybe I felt that way before, but that trauma I felt had faded when the really positive result revealed itself after the pain subsided.
If another cataract procedure is needed in the future, I won't be so cocky.