All My Eye - How It Happened.

April 18th 2001.

Driving home from work again I suffered another onset of flashing, this time in the upper right quadrant of my right eye.  It looked a bit like this ...   

April 19th.

Of course I was taking notice of the state of my eye now, and realised during the course of the day that I had a blind spot about where the flashing had been. At this stage this was just an absence of vision, quite difficult to describe, but the effect was a bit like this ... 

April 20th.(Friday)

Back to the doctor, and another referal to the eye specialist for Monday.
April 21st.

When I got up in the morning I found that the blind spot had become a black spot. Of course I wasn't happy, but consoled myself that I was seeing the specialist on Monday. By the time I went to bed I felt that the area of black had increased. It looked like this ...
April 22nd.

When I got up the black area again seemed to have expanded. I rang the doctors' emergency line, it being a Sunday, and by 10:30 was in the surgery. My doctor rang the Leeds General Infirmary(LGI) and by 11:30 I was being examined in the ophthalmology department.

The conclusion this time was that I had a retinal tear. The registrar surgeon came to have a look at me, and said that he thought his consultant would want to operate as soon as possible. I was fortunate that the tear was in the lower part of my eye (Remember the image on the back of your eye is upside down, so the black hole in the top of my field of view indicated damage in the lower part of the retina.) which meant that it was likely to progress more slowly than if it had been at the top.  

I spent the rest of the day sitting quietly at home, watching TV, and nursing the cats (as instructed).

April 23rd.

This morning the black hole was much as yesterday, and at 10:00 a.m. I got a call to go to see the consultant ophthalmic surgeon at LGI. (and to bring my overnight bag). By 1:00 p.m. I was on the ophthalmic ward and on the list for surgery in the morning.  


April 24th.

If you want to see operations very like what went on this day, then you'll find links on the links page  . I didn't look at these before I had surgery. It's up to you! Just remember, this surgery is painless at the time, and only uncomfortable for a couple of days afterwards.

Or you might prefer to look at the Moorfields Eye Hospital information leaflet on retinal surgery. (which is a good deal less "in your face"! ho ho)

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