having been in glasses since 4th grade, this is of significant importance to me.
everything was going just "run of the mill" when near the end of my appointment my eye dr (lets call him dr h) goes "do you have a family history of glaucoma."
me being the naive silly one that i am said "well i think my grandfather had to have surgery to remove it"
silly girl...he had surgery to remove his cateracts....
that being said...no i was not aware of any history of glaucoma. "WHY?!?"
and dr h says..."the hole in your optic nerve (which everyone has) is much larger than it should be. lets run some more tests. oh and medical insurance will now cover your eye doctor exams and tests because you are a "glaucoma suspect". someone who one day MAY develop glaucoma."
...ill be honest...i freaked out a little. but he said one day i MAY develop it...so breathe joy, breathe.
i was to return for some "baseline tests" so "we can monitor your eyes to see if there are any changes through the years"
so tests...pictures of my optic nerve, peripheral vision flashy light test, heat picture of my eyes, touch my eyes with the plastic thingy....tests.
i survived each and every one of them. "you'll be getting a phone call in a week or so to review your test."
...no phone call. wait another week (me calling them would mean that i would have to take some initiative..and well i didnt) still no call. wait another week...get a voicemail "we have the results of your tests, call us so we can review them. i call them back, "oh wait, i can't go over them on the phone, dr h wants you to come in and go over them with you as soon as possible."
that was definitely not was what supposed to happen, so i conned sweet hubby into going with me.
we arrive to go over my tests. i passed the peripheral flashy light test with flying colors (dr h even showed me where i cheated). the other tests were ok too...my pressure was not too high...the picture just showed what the doctor saw. but the heated picture...that is where the problem was. apparently, you should have fan like heat coming from the optic nerve going out to the edges of your eyes...i do not.
so the official diagnosis was glaucoma...at 27...i have glaucoma.
...or a major injury to my optic nerves...but dr h feels pretty confident that it is glaucoma.
so what does that mean for me?
i have the pleasure of taking an eye drop a day. thats it. simple as that.
the eye drop Lumigan, should keep my pressure from spiking and therefore prevent further injury or enlargement to the hole in my optic nerve.
if it doesnt, then i could start to lose my peripheral vision, and if we dont do something about it, i could slowly lose my vision. if i lose any of it, i cant get it back. thats is why dr h is so glad we "caught it" so early.
so side effects of Lumigan:
~ my eyelashes will become longer *reversible with discontinuance of drop
~ my eyelashes will become fuller *reversible with discontinuance of drop
~ my eyelashes will become darker *reversible with discontinuance of drop
~ my beautiful brown eyes will become browner (no matter what color your eyes are the drops make them browner)*non-reversible
~ my eyelids may become darker *reversible with discontinuance of drop
~ dry eye, scratchy eye, eye fatigue (these are the side effects i am actually experiencing)
i have decided that i can handle this...and i can conquer this..."it aint nothin but a thang" (i cant believe i just said that)
so i have been on the drops for two weeks now (no i havent noticed any difference in my eye lashes).
i went for a follow-up appt to test my pressure and look at my optic nerve again. so they touched my eye with the icare tonometer (anyone that says they cant feel it...is lying...and i wear contacts) and my pressure had gone up (gasp). definitely not supposed to happen. so they retested...it was a little bit better, but not what dr h wanted to see. what to do what to do?
im to continue with the Lumigan, and hopefully my pressure will drop a little bit more. dr h also added another drop to help with my eye fatigue, scratchy-ness, and dryness.
but like i said, i can handle this...im not going to let it conquer me. its just a lable, and believe me, i know that anyone can overcome lables :)
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