Search Results for: Linda Sarasino eye surgery

Eye Surgery

Posted on by Thor

I have been seeing double and no it is not because I had too much to drink. It has gotten to the point where I hesitate to drive at night because there are far too many lines on the road.

Going to a regular eye doctor, I was diagnosed with macular degeneration. What that means is that the retina inside my eyeball is swollen and therefor my vision is distorted in that eye. since one eye is unaffected, by binocular vision causes me to see two of everything. This is not an idea situation for a visual artist.

A friend drove me to The Orlando Ophthalmology  Surgery Center. It was scheduled for 6:30am but was thankfully rescheduled for 8am. The receptionist asked which eye need surgery, I said my left eye and pointed at it. He responded with Right Eye, and we had to correct him. There was the usual agonizing wait in the waiting room. I had sketched this waiting room before since I took another fried in for an eye surgery years ago. I felt less inclined to sketch but once I put a few lines on the page I was called in.

There is no HEPA air filtration system in the waiting room or in the pre-op gurney waiting area as far as I could see. I was intubated. pointing my toes in pain when the needle was shoved into a vein in my hand. An anesthesiologist and nurse who would control the drip both asked me a series of questions. I was asked multiple times which eye needed surgery and they pasted a sticky note above that eye. My surgeon came in and asked me again and he signed off on the sticky note. A clear eye shield was placed over my other eye.I wonder how many incorrect eyes they jabbed before they developed this stream of checks and balances.

As I lay on the gurney the lights blacked out and then flickered back on. A nurse joked that they really should pay the power bill In another passing conversation a nurse said she would marry for money rather than love. None of the nurses wore masks though the anesthesiologist wore hers as a chin strap. I had to take off my quality N-95 mask and wear the baggy yellow surgical mask they offered. I know it is worthless against an airborne virus and it is amazing that doctors and nurses do not. I had a brand new n-95 mask in my bag, but I could not use that either. I breathed as shallow as possible especially since one nurse was coughing up a lung. I felt like I was in a horrific third world emergency room. Doctors and nurses who are not required to wear masks refuse to wear them because the do not care about the health of their patients. They are actively promoting and encouraging infection. In the surgery room, everyone wore their surgial masks which offered me some form of relief.

I was awake but groggy for the surgery. My doctor told me most patients don’t remember a thing. I however remember seeing everything as it happened. A blue bag was taped over my head. I saw a purple pitchfork shoved inside inside my eyeball from the left and it stabbed a sheet of film which waved in the fluid like a flag. After the surgery a patch was taped over the eye. when I tilt my head a black fluid line separates the red on top which is light shining though my eyelid, and grey below which I was told is a large air pocket in the eye. tilting my head makes that air pocked move up and down. Shaking my head makes it slosh around like an ocean wave. Watching that air pocket sloshing around tends to make me sea sick. I did some painting the first day after surgery but got sick to my stomach and had to lie on the couch for the rest of the day.

This is day two and I can type, but I need to keep the wonky eye closed so it doesn’t distract me too much.

 

Eye Surgery

Posted on by Thor

Artist Linda Sarasino had cateracts. Surgery was arranged for each of her eyes on separate days. Since the surgery would leave one eye with a highly dilated pupil, she needed to have someone take her to the surgery and get her home safely. I volunteered to drive. In the waiting room Linda had to fill out legal forms that pointed out every possible thing that could go wrong with the surgery with results such as blindness and death. She signed away her life and we waited. There were the usual doctors office golf and lifestyle magazine, but I decided to sketch.

Finally she was called back to the surgery room and I waited alone. She left behind her bag glasses and jacket. Time moved slowly. Surgery would involve inserting a corrective lens inside her cornea to correct her vision. She had to use eye drops 4 times a day for two days leading up to the surgery. The procedure itself would take just 15 minutes and she would be given anesthesia. The anesthesia can cause amnesia which means many people do not remember the procedure. She has had a bad reaction to the drug that causes the amnesia so they had to reduce the amount given to her. She wasn’t knocked out and she was able to see the knife cut into her eye and the lens inserted. A bright light distorted and gave her the impression that she was experiencing an LSD trip.

This is a procedure done every day and considered quite routine. But it isn’t routine for the person having it done. I sat waiting for well over 15 minutes and the legal forms had my mind wandering to worst case scenarios. When I was called back, Linda was in a wheel chair. A plastic mesh eye patch was over the affected eye. Being transparent if kept her from looking like a pirate. She was wheeled to the back door and then we walked to my ca in the parking lot.

That night, I asked her to go outside to look at the sunset overlooking a golf course. She covered her eye that had the surgery and looked at the sunset and then covered that eye to look through the new lens. She started to cry. She had never see the colors so vibrant and pure. The cataract caused everything to have a yellowish dull cast. She pointed to some subtle wisps of pink clouds  on the northern horizon. I couldn’t see the same pink. Her vision was now better than my own. as the sky darkened, I took a picture of her with her arms outstretched looking like Julie Andrews on a mountain top. As an artist sight means everything, and she had been given the gift of being able to see the world in a brand new way.