brutus, being almost blind since the fifth grade, has now decided he's going to take the plunge and do lasik surgery. He and I have only been discussing this for the past five years!

Without his glasses, he cannot recognize someone from 5 feet; he sees shapes and fuzzy images. (that's one of the reasons he bought the Golf Sky Caddie - to help in his distance vision).

He's used contacts in the past, and he can see better than with glasses; although after about 4-6 hours, the contacts really bother his eyes and he had to take them out. But, too, with contacts, he finally was able to roll over in bed at night and actually see the time!

So, today, he went to Eye Care One on Washington Road and went through numerous tests (the tests tell a person if they are a candidate for lasik surgery), which took all of the morning and part of the afternoon to complete. Eye Care One has a new machine that corrects a variety of vision problems, and that's what finally made up his mind to do it. brutus now knows that 20/20 is not the same for all people (yes, Eye Care One explained that as well).

One week from Thursday, Jan. 24, @ 8am, brutus gets his new eyes. He can't wait! He is so excited about this, as he hasn't had good eye sight since such an early age. And, I'm happy for him.


Has anyone has Lasik Surgery? If so, how did it go?

I had Lasik in 2000 and love it!! I have been wearing glasses since 5th grade. My glasses were like coke bottles they were so thick. I wore contacts for 11 years before getting the surgery. I still love it!

After we finish paying for our third set of braces... arrrr.... I would love to have lasik surgery. I have been wearing glasses for almost 30 years and am so tired of them. Good luck Brutus, I am excited for you!

How much is it going to set you back, if I may ask?

Good luck and let us know. I've been wearing glasses now for about 18 years. I've been in bi-focals for about 14. My eyes have steadily gotten worse in the last few years.

I see it is still expensive, but at least insurance is paying a little now. I think I paid $4800 when I had it done. Insurance wouldn't cover any of the surgery though. I went to Atlanta and had it done at Emory. It is amazing. The surgery takes a matter of minutes but you can see an improvement immediately. As the day went on, my vision just continued to improve.

One day closer!!

Thanks for the financial info Brutus, 13 more months for braces and I would love to have this surgery. Let us know how everything goes.

Good Luck! I know you will be happy!!

LASIK-1 was the best thing I’ve ever done for myself. I am a mother of a 3 year old and a 1 year old and that means a lot of waking up in the middle of the night. This translated to sleeping in my contacts so that I could see what I was doing when I had to check on my kids; after 20 years, it was starting to take a toll on the health of my eyes. Dr. Wiles is so informative and has such a calm demeanor; he put me at ease even though I was nervous about the procedure. He went through all of the steps involved in the treatment so that I knew exactly what to expect. I appreciate everything he has done to make my vision what it is today. I can now see 20/20 with no help."

I wish Thursday would hurry up! Can you tell that I am Excited!!!

8:00 AM and I can hardly wait

Today is the day! Can't wait to hear.

Disappointment is Large. Boop and I were in the waiting room and they were dilating my eyes and things just seemed to slow down. I could tell something was going on but didn’t have a clue to what. Next thing I realize is that they are re-running some tests.
Did I say that there is some deep disappointment here? In a few minutes there is my eye-doctor, the surgeon, and his assistant in the room and that the surgeon had found a problem, and it is that I have cataracts in both eyes, not real bad yet but they have to be dealt with. Now in a matter of an hour I went from having Lasik to having cataract surgery one eye at a time with the first one being sometime next month. I will get the exact date and time one day next week. In this surgery they remove the cataract which (I think) removes lens of the eye and replaces it with a ceramic lens of whatever power you need and this corrects your distance vision. The results end up the same as lasik it’s just a lot more difficult to get to the end and they only do one eye at a time so there is that difficult time period to get thru. I will post more about this later.

I am so sorry about that. I hope everything goes ok so you can still have the lasik surgery. Good luck and if there is anything I can do to help let me know.

Sorry about that!!

There is a Silver Lining in this cloud. It is more difficult and will take a little longer but in the end I will have the same results and I can still throw my glasses away.

Sorry to hear you couldn't get it done today. But like you said, it will be the same effect, just will take a little longer.

Hang in there. It will all work out!!

That's what I told him agrit. The cateract surgery is for the best; downside is only one eye can be done at a time, and it takes about a month for the first eye to heal before they will do the second eye. The surgeon said the cateract surgery will have the same result, if not better than lasik. Won't need the lasik either.

Another plus is that our insurance will pay all, or most of the cateract surgery. Although, we had already planned to pay for the lasik.

I was thinking that too...that your insurance will cover more of this surgery than the lasik.

Now for the lastest in as the Eyes - Turn
I go in for Pre-Op on 2/11 @ 9:00 AM and for Surgery on 2/19 on the right eye.
They will give me the time at the Pre-Op.

I'm happy it turned out as it has; brutus was disappointed at first, but in the long run, it is the best thing to do.

I am starting to get excited again!!! I go for Pre-Op on the 11 and surgery on the right eye the 19th. I am excited all over again!

Pre-Op in the morning at 0900.

I had the pre-op this morning and there was a cancelation so I get the right eye done tomorrow morning at 11:00 AM.

WooHoo!!!! Good luck. Have Boopie let us know how you are!

Good luck Brutus. I will be thinking of you both.

brutus is doing really good; the surgery went great, we go back tomorrow morning and get the patch taken off. He said he can already see out of his right eye. Normally, without his glasses, he can see a shape about 3 feet from him. When they brought him back to the room, he was reading the words on a board about 7 feet from him! (and that was out of the corner of his eye - he has an eye patch on).

It's damned amazing what can be done in today's age of science.

I'm really glad he's doing so good!!!

On Wednesday I was seeing 20/25 @ 8:30 AM (Only 18 hours after surgery and still healing). It's only going to get better. I go back Monday for the 7 day check up. (I drove today for the first time without glasses) My right eye sees distance and the left eye sees close up. It will stay this way until the surgery on the left eye. I tried to wear my glasses with the right lens removed but it doesn't seem to make any difference. I don’t see any different with or without the glasses. I used to lie in bed and listen to whatever was on TV but last night I put the clear shield on and really watched TV.

Yea... so now, instead of him falling asleep quickly while listening to the tv, he'll be watching the tv most of the night! (I can't go to sleep with a tv on; well, most of the time anyways!)