I CAN SEE!!! PRAISE JESUS I can see!
It`s been nearly 2 months since my surgery, and I waited to post a review because I wanted to test drive my eyes first.
Being a UW alumni, I decided to go to TLC at UW. Turns out being an alumni doesn't make the surgery that much cheaper, but still, my loyalty runs deep. After being told I was a candidate, I scheduled my surgery within the next 2 days because they had a cancellation.
The only time I had a slight hesitation is when you're asked to write out a sentence in a box, something like, "I UNDERSTAND THAT I MAY NEED GLASSES AFTER SURGERY." But hey, at that point I was already gung-ho, so I signed my eyes away.
I went into my surgery on a Friday, and about 3.5 hours later I was cozy in my bed resting. The actual surgery DID NOT HURT at all. I was told that I should be able to go back to work on Monday. Wrong. It took me about a week to get back into the regular swing of things. I had a lot of complications with my right eye, and it was VERY, VERY uncomfortable for a week. I had to go into the clinic about every other day for about 2 weeks to keep checking up on my right eye. As for when I could see absolutely clearly, it took about 2 weeks.
6 weeks later, my left eye is 20/20. My right eye is not quite 20/20, and is slightly nearsighted. Sitting from the tv, about 10 feet away on the couch, I have to really squint to read the channels on the guide. Driving at night, I noticed that lights do have glare, and signs are blurry. Curious, I tried my husband's weak prescription glasses, and voila-perfect vision. When I was told my right eye was near-sighted I asked if they would re-do the right eye, and was told no. The vision is just slightly off-not worth correcting. So back to the hand written sentence, I got nothing.
They told me a million times, "Everyone's eyes are different, so they heal differently. Yours happened to take longer. And they are still healing now." Response-nod slowly each time.
The ONLY thing I have to complain about the procedure, is that they didn't prepare me for how bad it could be afterwards. I understand everyone is different, but it would have been good to know that *some patients* could be out of work for a week, that they could have complications that would require daily visits, that the drops are super annoying and expensive (I'm still on them now and some are like glue; really gross).
All of the staff are great, Dr. Willms is fantastic. She really did take good care of me-took her time, answered all my questions every visit. I saw her nearly every other day for 2 weeks, and you can tell she is really concerned about your vision and the results of Lasik.
My next appointment is in January 2012. So while glasses make things much more crisp, I'm off my dependency on glasses and contacts, and that really was the point of this surgery for me. I haven't seen this clearly without glasses/contacts since I was 10 years old...which was 10 years ago (HA!!! I wish.). So though my results aren't 100%, I'd do it again tomorrow. read more