and the reason I haven't blogged in a lonnnnnnnnnnng time is that it was hating me back (wasn't letting me log in!!) soooo...
the "longer version of the story" never made it online... and it has been too long -- I can't remember all the things I was going to talk about in the longer version... but here are some more details -- the ones I *can* remember...
I started the day by taking a percocet for relaxation -- because I figured I wasn't driving and I didn't want to feel nervous or wiggly while they were shooting laser beams at my eyeballs, I took one just before Mom picked me up. When we got there, I got signed in, she sat knitting while they took me back into an exam room... the first nurse did the pressure test (yellow drops) and then did the basic eye exam (reading the chart from across the room) then dilated my eye (thank God they only did the right eye, if they had done both I would have been miserable all day) and said she'd be back in five minutes to dilate it some more. (this is new)
Once she did the second time, I was taken to the back waiting room and took out my iPod and knitting (b/c they only did the one eye, I could knit while waiting for my pupil to dilate (which is great because that takes about 20 minutes!)... so I ran back to the front waiting room where Mom was watching my stuff and grabbed my current pair of socks to work on.
After about 25 minutes, they called me back to the "Procedure Room" -- where they had taken the photos of my retina that first day this all happened... and by now the percocet had kicked in nicely and I was feeling relaxed and not very scared. They sat me down in the chair in front of what looked like a fancy exam machine (with the forehead strap and chin rest just like when they do the checkups) and the doctor was on the other side of it. They had me tilt my head back and they put 2 more drops in my right eye (this makes about 8 so far that morning) to numb it -- because it was going to have this thing resting against it (which, for lack of any better way to describe it -- looked like a kid's kaliedoscope -- narrow at one end and wider at the other... the narrow end went right up against the laser machine and the wider end (which had a coating of some sort of jelly on it so as to not scratch my eyeball) went up against my eye to keep it open and to keep my eyelashes from getting in the way.
When they described this and what they were going to do -- I was thinking "umm yikes that's gonna be painful and uncomfortable" but because of the numbing drops -- I didn't really feel any of that...
They had me put my head in the chin rest and hold onto the handles just below. There were two nurses in the room with the doctor, one was training on how to do this and the other was the trainer... she was the one who was holding my head in place. When I say this I mean that her hand was just behind my head, gently resting on the back of it -- not really pushing on it, but just applying a very gentle pressure to make sure it stayed still.
The doctor started to type on a computer and put his foot on something similar to a sewing machine pedal and told me to look straight ahead. I found a focus point on the wall behind him and the flashes began. It's going to sound weird but at some points it felt better to close my left eye and just kind of watch the flashes in my right eye. The nurse holding my head would occasionally call out a number (at first the numbers were low, 30 etc. but then they increased by large increments -- 50 or more). When she said 400something I was really starting to feel the discomfort of the procedure. My eye felt very dry and achy -- like I had watched too much tv or spent wayyyy too much time on the internet or something. So I told them it was starting to hurt and they said I was doing REALLY well and that they were almost done. She called out a few more numbers and the last one was like 630 and then we were done.
It turns out that what she was calling out was numbers of pulses that he had shot at my eye. Each pulse being a flash. They told me that I did really well (they kept saying this over and over as if shocked -- and all I could think was "well... just offer everyone a percocet when you dilate the pupils and ppl would probably do soooo much better!!!").
I felt really nauseated when it was over -- the room by that point was VERY warm (4 people breathing for 20 minutes in a room with no windows and with a laser shooting pulses for 20 minutes -- it was stifling in there. They brought me a couple of glasses of water and had me lie down on the reclining exam chair nearby -- the trainer nurse brought me a little eye-pack that was frozen/chilled to hold over my eye and cool things down. That really helped -- although it didn't stay cool for long.
I got out to the lobby and made my followup appointment and Mom and I got in the elevator to go down to the lobby and exit -- we're standing there and she pushes the "2" button.... (nothing happens) ... I giggle and say "umm we're *on* the second floor Mom" and we both laugh.
So then we're walking across the parking lot to the car (she had driven Dad's car because of the snow and because he was taking her car up to Marion for a service appointment). She starts walking behind me and away from me -- I'm going directly towards the car. I stop and stand right beside the passenger door wondering where she was going. She comes back and unlocks the door and we both climb in and I'm giggling.
"Did you forget what car you'd brought?" I ask.
"yeah...." she laughed "Aren't you glad you've got me along to take care of you!!??"
We both laughed until tears were running down our faces.
She dropped me off at the house and I took a brief nap and then she picked me up again and we went out to lunch at Pei Wei's with Harriet...