I’ve had a problem with my right eye for about a year now known as a ‘recurrent corneal erosion.’ What this means is that the very outer layer of cells in my cornea doesn’t adhere very strongly to the next layer down. This has meant that I can’t wear contacts for about a year, as the outer part of my cornea would stick to them more than half the time. Taking out the contact lens resulted in literally removing part of my eye and exposing all the nerve endings in it. This also randomly happens when it sticks to my eyelid, or when abrasive particulates (dirt, eyelash, etc) get in my right eye. As a further problem this irregularity is directly over the pupil, meaning that my vision in that eye can sometimes be not entirely clear. This is not a problem with anything other than reading distant text, but it’s still an annoyance.
A picture of this problem, taken yesterday, looks like this (excuse the cell phone camera photo of a computer monitor):
The line in the image is essentially a fault line in my eye.
I’ve been undergoing treatment for this for some time now, but recently it’s become more intensive. The time has come to actually fix this problem. This month I’m having required laser surgery on both my right and left eyes; the left to correct the imbalance that will be caused when they fix my right. This is PRK/PTK, not LASIK. While I will be getting vision corrective surgery (no more glasses or contacts!) as a result of this, the actual reason the surgery is being done is to scrape off the entirety of my outer cornea and let a new one grow in its place, in the process fixing the irregularity and my recurrent erosion.
I go in for surgery on the 18th. Wish me luck.
