Eye-Tastrophie

So since so many people have wanted updated as to my eye situation, I thought I should finish that story. From my Sinulog post, you probably know that a few weeks ago Mackenzie sprayed 100% deet in my right eye and I ended up in the hospital having it flushed because it can ruin your vision. Well, sadly that’s not the end of the story. After a week of my eye feeling relatively normal, I thought my trouble from the bug spray incident was over. I hadn’t felt any “foreign body sensation” as the doctor called it and my eye wasn’t red anymore, so 2 weekends ago, I went to the beach with Mackenzie, Amber, Naomi, and Davina. We had a fabulous time playing in the ocean, building sand castles, climbing coconut trees (SUPER FUN!) and getting to know each other, but I think I got some sand in my eyes because my right eye felt very irritated afterwards. When this feeling did not go away in the next 24 hours, I started getting worried.

I went to the ER here in Tacloban on Monday, but the eye specialist was not at the hospital so another doctor gave me some antibacterial drops and told me to go see the eye doctor the next day at 9:00 because that is when her office opened. So the next morning, Mackenzie, Davina, and I went to the hospital at about 8 (because you can’t really make appointments, its just first come first serve) and found out that her office opens at 10:30, so we decided to wait. At about 11:15 the eye doctor arrived and when I went in she told me that I had gotten a respiratory infection in my eye because my eye was not producing the protective films and juices it normally does because of the trauma from the bug spray! Therefore, she added some anti-inflammatory medicine to my anti-bacterial and gave me directions to put in eye drops every 2 hours. This seemed like a good plan and the next day my eye seemed rather relieved. I also called my dad and he talked to our doctor so that I would know of any warning signs I should look for in case this started getting worse. He said to go back to the doctor if there was excessive discharge, my vision got blurry, or I became light sensitive.

So for one day my eye seemed fine, but then on Wednesday night my vision started getting a little blurry out of that eye. By this point I started freaking out and wondering if I should go home to have this whole situation taken care of. The next day I went back to the doctor who told me that I was having a severe allergic reaction to something (probably one of the medications) in my eye, so she changed all my medications, added an anti-allergy medicine and told me to come back on Saturday. I still couldn’t believe that all this was happening from the bug spray. Over the next two days I didn’t see much improvement. My eye continued to be very red and swollen and I would also wake up every morning with my eye lashes stuck to my face with thick tacky discharge. Naomi told me it looked like a zombie had attacked me, but only on half my face. My appointment on Saturday really only consisted of the doctor telling me to keep letting the medicine work, to add placing a cold compress on my eye twice a day, and to come back again on Monday.

Monday, however, was the bearer of good news. My eye is evidently going to survive all of this because it no longer looks like cobblestones (that is what the doctor described the inside of my eye as). Evidently the allergy had caused lots of tiny bumps to appear that looked like cobblestones, but now they are flattening out, allowing my vision to repair itself. By now, my eye is its regular white color, my eyelashes are not held captive every morning, and my eye is open almost all the way. Therefore, I think that as long as I can prevent anything else from getting into it, I will be alright. (And as long as I keep Mackenzie’s bug spray FAR FAR away!)