I already had some minor surgery with local anesthesic and I didn't have any anxiety, but there's something about having something done to the eyes while fully awake that I find frightening.
When a cornea flap is cut, you are cutting a lot of innervation to the cornea surface, this for many people means fairly persistent dry-eyes. In addition the scaring of the cornea in the incision flap rim, can also create visual artefacts like Halos, more visible during nightime as your pupil expands and may catch some of the visual distortion of the scar tissue.
I am describing from experience so your mileage may vary. At the end of the day I would probably still go ahead with the surgery but I genuinely feel that it was not thoroughly explained to me, ahead of the surgery, what all the potential side-effects could be.
Now, this guy has a dry sense of humor so he said, "You may notice that I'm wearing glasses ..."
And I guess that was all of the input I needed.
I once had a day at work where the pain was so bad I thought: This is it. I can‘t keep on working, I will lose my job and live on disability from now on.
After some conversations with healthy people, I learned that many can not even imagine dry eye pain. One sentence stuck out: „I didn‘t know eyes could hurt.“
What I wanna say is: Don‘t risk it. Lasik can ruin your life.
I would love to do lasik! But any potential worsening of my dry eyes is not worth it. I would still sacrifice my whole fortune to have healthy eyes again. (to be clear: I did not have lasik, but I probably suffer from permanent isotretinoin damage)
But I was able to reverse a majority of it and continue to do after learning Tribulus upregulates androgen receptors in the brain, which seems to control the aqueous liquid in our eyes.
I'm not sure what Vitamin A does to the body. From a cursory glance, it seems to affect skin androgen receptors, which would explain why it affected your eyes but if it has a similar affect, you might want to consider Tribulus.
Start off with a low dosage. Say 1 pill daily for a week, then taper off. On and off for a few months.
I strongly recommend dissolving an oral pill of hyaluronic acid twice daily -do not swallow the pill whole, it won‘t dissolve and you will shit a tiny gelatine egg.
Besides that eye heating masks and lid-hygiene (e.g. blephacura) do wonders.
As for AR expression, I believe L-Carnitin should also improve it. Creatine should increase DHT.
But I am afraid to haphazardly increase my androgens or receptor expression because of my AGA.
But I’m not sure you understand. My dry eyes are basically gone. And it’s only been a few months. Every time I take the treatment it gets better. Not just that but the lights sensitivity, glares, and migraines are basically down to 10%.
I understand the hesitation however. I hope you continue to improve.
You just take it a week and feel better? I can try that much.
But oral hyaluronic acid should truly be a, no, the first line treatment for dry eye and many eye doctors don‘t even knowing about it is another medical tragedy.
<quote>
But Mr. Ramirez says that as far as his surgeon is concerned, he is a success story.
“My vision is considered 20/20, because I see the A’s, B’s and C’s all the way down the chart,” said Mr. Ramirez. “But I see three A’s, three B’s, three C’s.”
</quote>
Thanks for the heads-up, I'll make sure I'm OK with the potential side effects if I go forward with it.
For ICL, they'd say things like, "You'll feel a little pinch" before they did something, and I barely noticed that anything was happening.
For Lasik, it was nothing. The most uncomfortable part of the procedure was while they were prepping me, and even that wasn't anything worth talking about unless you have some phobia.
It's been a few years now and I barely remember anything about the procedure beyond the room layouts and remembering thinking it went much easier than I expected.
Unfortunately I have no memory of the procedure itself, so I can't comment on any discomfort or lack thereof. I don't think I was ever told I'd be put under general anesthesia, so it seemed a bit odd at the time to walk in and out with no memory of in-between. Does anyone know if this is a common side effect (or intentional effect) of drugs commonly used during ICL implantation surgery?
I've read enough horror stories to know it's not worth the risk, especially when my optometrist told me my vision would worsen anyways in 10 years.
Relevant to the OP it was quite a procedure to experience. I was a little concerned before but it was quite interesting to watch the corneal flat be cut open (with no feeling at all) and peeled back, then see the little laser flashes accompanied by (weirdly) a smell of burned hair. When they dropped the flap back down my vision was instantly corrected, although initially a bit cloudy.
The glasses I was prescribed a few years ago are almost useless today, so I cannot help thinking that LASIK would just correct my vision at a point in time, and then a couple of years later it would be back to glasses. Not worth the risks in the slightest.
I'm not big on the idea of touching my eye but the numbing drops are amazing- after I'd had a couple of eyeball pressure tests I got used to the odd sensation of things touching my eyes without me flinching.
There's a Facebook group called LASIK Complications Support Group that has 3-4 people joining it daily desperate for help from the pain they're left with. LASIK as an industrial complex has done well to suppress the problems. In 2011 one of the FDA expert advisors who voted to approve LASIK wrote a public letter to FDA asking them to immediately recall LASIK, as he said there was data they were ignoring that they shouldn't have been ignoring, and that it should never have been approved.
A story of suicide post LASIK (actually specifically she did "SMILE") of a news reporter Jessica Starr - many articles on her, but here's two: https://www.ctvnews.ca/w5/families-deal-with-repercussions-a... + https://www.fox2detroit.com/news/in-her-own-words-jessica-st...:
""She looked at me and she said, 'Dan [her husband], it's like my eyes and my brain aren't communicating like they used to. I can't process like I used to. I'm not visualizing things like I used to,'" Dan said.'
My hypothesis is that the more creative and sensitive a person is (therefore less redundancy in neural networks) the more fragile and detrimental damage/injury caused by LASIK.
The cornea is the most sensitive tissue in the body with 300-600 times the density of pain receptors than your skin, and LASIK lies - your cornea doesn't/can't heal on its own.
At least wait until the stromal stem cell treatment available clinically. Human clinical trials in India were fast tracked under compassionate grounds, the original research on animal models from University of Pittsburgh, that were highly successful healing/regenerating deep/severe scarring and chemical burns. It'll likely take anywhere from 2-5 years, with the pandemic delaying things, for it to be available in India/US with FDA approval.
I can't even put contact lenses in my eye myself, but getting operated was a breeze. I have been glasses free for 8 yrs now - its great!
I'm very nearsighted (I can't see distant objects clearly without glasses), and I know people's ability to see close objects or read diminishes with age. My plan has been to remain nearsighted in hopes I can always read without glasses. Many people have their far sight improve as they approach 40 or 50.