Cataract surgery this morning on right eye.

[LuckyCharms]

Left eye gets done in 2 weeks.

Surgery was a piece of cake.

Have a nice day everyone.

[Polly Hennessey]

1. What a difference the surgery makes. Your days are going to be brighter and clearer. 👁️

[LuckyCharms]

51. Thanks, Polly!

[FM123]

2. Glad it went well!

Take good care of yourself!

[LuckyCharms]

52. Thank you! You take care as well!

[XanaDUer2]

3. Good!

[LuckyCharms]

53. Thanks!

[surfered]

4. Good luck. Now all you need are cheater glasses

[LuckyCharms]

54. Thank you!

[LiberalLoner]

5. Hope you heal up quickly and enjoy perfect vision soon! Was it painful at all?

[LuckyCharms]

9. No eye pain during surgery.

The worst part was that I was having trouble laying flat on the surgical table because I have a bad lower back, so they put some Fentanyl in the IV for the back pain in addition to the Versed.

I was awake for the whole thing.

Have a small amount of blood pooling in my eye, but nothing worrisome. Eye feels gritty right now. 3 different drops several times a day for a few weeks. Plastic eye patch when I go to sleep to keep from rubbing my eye in my sleep.

Anyone who is worried about getting this surgery...don't worry. It's nothing. Keeping up with the drops is the hardest part.

[LiberalLoner]

29. Thank you so so much. Yeah, I will need the surgery soon. Hope your eye feels more comfortable with every passing day!

[LuckyCharms]

50. For me, it got to the point where my retina doctor was having trouble

taking eye pictures because of the cataracts.

He said "Your cataracts are pretty goddamn bad and I can't see you routinely again until they are removed".

So he referred me to another eye doc.

He said if I waited another few years, the surgery would be problematic.

I'll be honest, I was pretty freaked out before the surgery, but it really is easy.

You'll do great!

[LogDog75]

67. Thanks for the info

My eye doctor says I'll probably need cataract surgery this year on my left eye so I have an idea as to what to expect. Now, if they could get rid of the floaters at the same time it wold be great.

[BOSSHOG]

26. Hello My Friend

Accidentally hit the alert button on your post. Fingers flying to fast. I apologize. I’ve never hit the alert button on anyone on purpose.

[greatauntoftriplets]

6. It makes such a difference.

It's been 13 years since my surgeries and I still don't need glasses.

[LuckyCharms]

48. I'm happy it worked out well for you!

[greatauntoftriplets]

49. Same here.

I hope that your second surgery goes well and that afterward you'll see like you did as a kid.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. I tell people cataracts were the best thing that ever happened to my eyes.

I couldn't read the blackboard in first grade. Got glasses the next year, wore them and/or contact lenses until the cataract surgery. Which for me happened about ten years younger than for most people. But yeah, best thing that ever happened to my eyes. For the first time ever I could open my eyes in the morning and actually read the clock across the room. Hooray!

[Silent Type]

16. Same here. I could never adapt to contacts. After cataract surgery could see my feet in the shower for the first time.

I could see the alarm clock without glasses too. Wore big thick glasses most of my life.

Knowing what I do now, I might have paid to have it done at at much younger age.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

18. I know things change over time,

but my eye doctor explained that the cataracts had to get bad enough to be removable surgically. Finally they got bad enough.

A friend of mine who had lens replacement done in relative youth (he would have been no more than 50), to correct nearsightedness, then couldn't get as good a lens replacement later on.

My entire life I've been glad I was born in a time and place where I could get glasses from an early age.

[Silent Type]

19. Honestly, if born in 1800s I'm not sure I would have survived because seriously doubt I could have found lenses

that would work.

When the doc said read what you see on the eye chart, my response was "what chart?"

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

22. You would have survived -- people don't die from poor vision

-- but you'd have had a much limited view and experience of the world. I know. I paid a lot of attention to how little I could see before those first glasses, and how much my vision deteriorated between new pairs. Truly sad. Once I got contact lenses at age 16, my eyesight stopped getting worse. By now it was something like 20-800 in the bad eye, and not much better in the good one.

[BOSSHOG]

27. I'm in that cycle now

Doc says, NO not yet. I do have an unwanted gaggle of floaters I’d like to plant somewhere.

[Paladin]

8. Had my cataracts taken care of a couple of years ago.

Like you say, the procedure was quick, painless, and easy. First time I've done without glasses (other than a $20 set of close-ups for reading) in 60 years. Absolutely love it.

[LuckyCharms]

47. Glad it worked out well for you, Paladin!

[Wounded Bear]

10. One of the best things I ever did was get my cataracts fixed...

Good luck!

[LuckyCharms]

46. Thanks, Wounded Bear!

[multigraincracker]

11. Get my left eye done on the 11th. After the right eye, I kept closing one eye and looking at the yellow snow.

Then close the other one and see white snow.
I can already drive at night now.

[LuckyCharms]

12. Right eye is very blurry right now.

Same with you right after your surgery?

Good luck with your upcoming left eye!

[multigraincracker]

14. For a few days and then began to clear up.

Close my left eye when driving and close my right eye when reading.

[LuckyCharms]

15. Thank you and best wishes to you.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

23. I could see clearly, completely clearly,

in about two hours after each surgery.

[LuckyCharms]

24. Great. I can't.

[questionseverything]

76. Don't worry, mine didn't come in clear until next morning

[Basso8vb]

13. They made me wait 2 months between eyes!

Glad your procedure was a success. Now wait for the clearest and brightest white light you've seen in decades.

[LuckyCharms]

45. Still blurry, but i can tell already that things look brighter!

Thanks!

[niyad]

17. Wishing you swift and complete recovery

[LuckyCharms]

44. Thanks a lot, niyad!

[Ptah]

20. Glad they did the right one.

The wrong one would be troublesome.

[LuckyCharms]

43. Indeed!

They had me point to my right eye, then she drew a few symbols above it with a marking pen to make sure they did the right one.

[Niagara]

21. Camera one, camera two...

Eye would throw in an eye pun but iris-ky as I'm only a pupil.

Sending healing wishes to you, Lucky!

[LuckyCharms]

40. Is that you, Niagara?

You're very photogenic!

Thank you for the good wishes!

[BOSSHOG]

25. Great News

My wife had it last year and she is very happy with the results

[LuckyCharms]

39. Good to hear!

[dflprincess]

28. I had mine done almost 3 years ago

Nervous before the first one was done, couldn't wait to get the second eye done.

I spent the two weeks before 2nd surgery covering each eye in turn & marveling at how bright everything was with the right eye. It was like the left had a piece of yellow cellophane over it. I have a couple other issues that didn't become obvious until after the cataract surgery (and unrelated to it) so I still wear glasses, but everything is still bright!

Enjoy!

[LuckyCharms]

38. Perfect description!

I had my right eye done. It's very blurry still and I can't see real well out of it, but I have noticed that everything looks brighter and whiter out of the blurry eye, and the eye that still has the cataract is giving everything a yellow tinge.

[Clouds Passing]

30. Follow drs orders, do not bend over or pick up heavy things

Happy Healing Lucky Charms 💚⭐️☘️🩷

[LuckyCharms]

37. Thank you! Yes, that's exactly what the doc told me in the follow up this morning.

No lifting, no bending over.

[True Dough]

31. Lucky

[LuckyCharms]

34. Yes! It's you riding a burro, naked.

Right?

[True Dough]

41. Squint a little more,

and I think you'll see it's a pony, not a burro.

[LuckyCharms]

42. OK, I squinted. It may be a pony, but it's hung like a horse!

[applegrove]

32. And did they give cake after the operation?

When my dad went through that they had to fast so when they were in recovery, where we were all sitting in a waiting room together, out came a trolly of muffins and orange juice. I was like "cocktails, hors deserves, how nice!"

My dad's two surgeries went really well. Glad you feel the same.

[LuckyCharms]

35. Banana nut muffin and a hot cup of coffee!

[Niagara]

68. Is it a requirement to eat something before being released?

Or can a patient leave without eating?

[applegrove]

69. They were highly required to eat after my dad's cataract.

[Niagara]

70. Good to know, applegrove

Thank you!

[LuckyCharms]

72. You have to fast from midnight onward the night before becuase you're getting anesthesia...

so they want your stomach empty so you don't aspirate any food while you are knocked out.

And you do not know the exact time of your surgery because they line the patients up one after another.

So you might not get out of there until 1000 - 1100AM.

Because of this, you are usually pretty hungry by the time you get out of there, so they feed you!



Edit to add: But you don't have to eat if you are not hungry (at least at the place I had mine done anyway).

[Niagara]

73. Typically my daily fasting hours are 6 -7pm until 1 -3pm the following day

Except for today, I had Niagara's approved pizza at 10am because I was feeling like having it although not hungry.


I can't eat foods that contain wheat flour or barley because of a non-Celiac gluten sensitivity.


I'll have to bring my own food for post surgeries. It's fine, I make better food anyways.

[applegrove]

74. They don't want you to fall over from low blood sugar

so they cherrily try and get everyone to have something.

[drray23]

33. yeah the most annoying thing is doing all the drops routine

so involved that the Dr gave us a printed spreadsheet to tick off each night when taking the 3 different kinds of drops for weeks at a time.

[LuckyCharms]

36. Yes, you have to do advanced calculus to figure out these stupid drops!

[dflprincess]

65. My doctor had a compound option for the drops

Insurance wouldn't pay for it but the out of pocket wasn't too bad. One drop two times a day.

[Ocelot II]

55. That's good to know!

I have to have that done soon, got a consultation with the doctor this week. I've heard it's not a big deal but medical procedures freak me out. Question: If you wear glasses what do you do in the two weeks while you wait for the other eye to be done?

[LuckyCharms]

56. I asked the same question.

The response boiled down to "wing it".

I think you will be able to get by ok...you'll adapt for that time period, and you may have to close one eye once in awhile, depending on what you are trying to see.

I had the right eye done, and I had a follow-up this morning. My right eye is still very blurry, but I can see out of it fairly well, and I was cleared to drive.

It's a whole month that you have to deal with the problem. Get the first eye done, it heals in two weeks, then get the other eye done and wait another two weeks for normalcy.

One of the reasons I put this OP in was to reassure people about the surgery.

It's really easy. They give you versed, and that takes away all of the anxiety (they also had to give me fentanyl in the IV because I have a bad back and had trouble laying flat).

You'll still be awake, but very relaxed. You'll have a bunch of numbing gel in your eye, so no pain.

I saw a very bright light, and three round things in my vision during the surgery. i just concentrated on looking at the round things.

Good luck, you'll do great!

[Ocelot II]

58. Thank you!!

I will probably have to keep wearing glasses anyhow because I also have astigmatism, but right now it's hard to read small print and to see road signs clearly when driving, and the optician said he couldn't do anything about it with a new glasses prescription - so here I am. Looking forward to the fix even though medical stuff scares me. I'm glad to know there will be drugs.

[LuckyCharms]

59. I forgot to mention...

Sometime during my travels at the surgery center yesterday, someone mentioned that if it gets too annoying during the transition period, and your glasses frame is such that you can pop out one of the lenses, then that might help as the eye that was operated on heals.

I wear those lightweight frameless glasses, and unfortunately, it would be difficult to remove a lens.

And to reassure you further, trust me, the drugs are so good, you are not going to care what you see during the surgery. You don't see any surgical instruments coming at you or anything like that, so you won't freak out at all.

[Ocelot II]

61. The scalpel coming at my eyeball was one of my freakout issues.

I kept thinking of that old surrealist movie Un Chien Andalou by Buñuel and Dali, with the sliced eyeball scene. It's very good to know I won't have to see that!

[LuckyCharms]

63. LOL I imagined it that way too.

All you will see is bright whiteness, and maybe some geometric artifacts like I did. And you literally don't feel a thing.

I have some eye pain now, but it's tolerable. Also, right after the surgery, it just felt like a grain of sand in my eye.

I have some blood pooling in the white part of the eye, but the follow-up doc said that happens sometime, and it will resolve.

You will have a follow up visit the day after the surgery. They check your vision and your eye pressure. All very easy. No worries.

[drray23]

71. Another famous movie wirh such a scene

Is clockwork orange. That's what came to my mind.

[LudwigPastorius]

75. The splinter in the eye scene in....

Zombie Flesh Eaters is another one that scarred me when I was a kid.

[dflprincess]

66. Per my doctor's advice, I didn't wear my glasses

It's amazing how the good eye just takes over. I was also lucky that the blurriness cleared up fast for me. I was comfortable driving the day after.

[Submariner]

57. Your posts always make me hungry

I think there's one blue eye in the bunch

[LuckyCharms]

60. Eyeball soup is the best!

Especially if you get one of the rare crunchy ones!

[Kali999]

62. at surgery center

For my honeys left eye. He has restless legs so they are giving him some sorta block. I imagine the doctor was surprised on the first one. Congratulations on yours.

[LuckyCharms]

64. I was moaning in pain laying flat because of a bad back, so

they gave me fentanyl as well as versed through the IV. Also, they could not get me positioned correctly so they, as they put it, "wrapped me up like a mummy" and taped my head in one position.

[Sibelius Fan]

77. My wife had both eyes done last week. Cataracts removed and new lenses.

She’s amazed at the improvement.

BYW - we’re on Medicare. Procedure was around $12,000. Our copay was $0. Kaiser Permanente.