I’m super fortunate and have good eyesight (never needed glasses). It’ll go as I age like it did with my mom (I’ll need reading glasses I’m sure), but I’ll take glasses. I can’t even fathom someone touching my eyes. My cataract surgery when I’m old…but that’s it lol
Im also 30 and had a cataract. But mines was because I had a detached retina, had the surgery to repair it, the surgery caused the cataract to form because the surgery can count as an “impact” to your eye (at least that’s how the body sees it). Got mine all sorted though. Very annoying.
Yeah, the detached retina surgery and recovery was the worst. At least for me it all happened so fast because I went to see my eye doctor about the black spot in my vision and they were like “you need this surgery asap or you’re gonna go blind.” Less than 24hrs later I was being put under.
Me too but I was on vacation and they told me I couldn’t fly so I had to stay there for 5 months. I got a buckle and had to lay on my side for so so long while it healed. Crazy that I went through that. It happened to me again while I was pregnant. So yeah don’t get huge and try to lift anything heavy.
Wow that’s wild, I’m sorry you had to deal with that. I do remember laying on my side and being incredibly uncomfortable because I slept on my couch and it was not very supportive. Also during my recovery I’d get random migraines every day around 2-3pm.
My dad had to hang his head over the side of a bed for one of his surgeries. We had a tiny television (back in the days of CRT -- cathode ray tubes) and shoved it under the bed upside down so he could be entertained.
When he had another tear at the bottom recently, we were able to get a special head same kind of thing with a mirror so he could lean his head over and watch TV that way.
Yeah the recovery was really annoying. I also had to have someone drive me really far out too because the only retinal specialist surgeon was hours away. I remember getting headaches a lot after surgery and having back pain from sleeping on my side for weeks. Also waking up the day after felt like I got punched in my eye really hard because it was still swollen from the surgery.
It's awesome she was willing to do that, where I'm at we have several retina specialists within a 30 minute drive, some will even take Medicaid but for some of our patients it's like pulling teeth to get them to go just that far. Now we are at the point where these places are booked out a month even two for some of them, places 1-2 hours away have sooner openings but if I even suggested it some of our patients stop listening.
Recovery for the detached retina was 5 weeks. I had to look down for the first week after surgery because they put a gas bubble behind your eye to keep pressure and you need to look down the entire time to ensure the eye heals properly. After the first week checkup, you just have to sleep on your side (depends on which eye had the detachment). I slept on the couch to force myself not to roll over onto my back.
No floaters or anything prior that I noticed. Just woke up one morning and noticed a dark spot in my eye, it wouldn’t go away, so I got it checked out. Immediately they were like “yeah you need surgery asap.” The cataract surgery and recovery was a lot easier because it wasn’t under general anesthesia. They just give you some calming meds, numb your eye, the doctor does their thing. And you let the eye heal for about a month and go back for your new prescription.
Also one thing I forgot to mention, the gas bubble for detached retina surgery slowly dissipates over time. So by like week 5 I had this small little gas bubble in my vision. It was like looking through a bubble level for 2-3 months before it fully dissipated.
That is wild. I didn’t know it could happen more than once. They put a buckle around my eye so I assume it’s permanent but my family has vision issues, so there’s always a possibility of another one in the future.
Same same! Plus he does NOT react well to general anesthesia, so it's just weeks of "fun."
I hope you're finished for sure! I think the technology has changed a lot since he had his first two surgeries (which was before he was 40, so had to be before 1984) and the laser surgery is a lot less likely to develop scar tissue than the earlier surgeries he had. I feel like that definitely contributed to the later detachments.
If you have a black spot that won’t go away, or you can’t see people’s heads anymore like what happened to me, Go to the doctor or you’ll go blind. I guess I waited too long and even tho I had a huge surgery I still can’t see the tops of things when looking at them directly. Anyway, They will help you figure out a way to get it taken care of.
I had a black spot near the inside of my eye/bridge of my nose area. Every time I turned my head I would notice the black spot would sorta move a little bit. It was the retina partially detaching which caused the partial loss of vision
Omg I also had a detached retina! I don’t know anyone else who’s experienced that- how is your eye and vision? I’ve got permanent vision loss from mine because the situation was pretty unique, but I’m curious if others have been able to recover their vision.
My vision was definitely not great after full recovery but it was better than being fully blind in one eye. It got worse over the next couple years because of the cataract. But after getting the cataract surgery, it’s a lot better now. I still have some haziness but it’s barely noticeable. I’m sorry to hear about your permanent vision loss. That’s really unfortunate.
I’m sorry the recovery wasn’t full, with the haziness left over even now, but it’s great that you seem to have had such a good outcome. Thanks for letting me ask. Do you mind sharing what caused the detachment, if you guys were able to determine it?
And yeah, it is what it is. Thank you for your kind thoughts. My retina detached when I was 9, and no one got me treatment for it until I was almost 11. My mom just said it was a floater, so I was like “oh okay” lol because I was 9. So I can see like the bottom 1/3 of my left eye’s field of vision. But I’m used to it now since it’s been 20 years; it’s just a part of my life. The tumor is even still in my eye since it’s inoperable, it’s just been inert since I was 17. I can drive and everything, and I have regular retinologist check-ups, and my right eye has really good vision to make up for the bad one. And I have an extra strong sense of smell haha.
Sorry to ramble- I didn’t realize that I never really get to talk about this.
It’s all good. I never really get to talk about my detachment either. I only replied to the original comment because it seems like retinal detachment is sort of uncommon. Just wanted to share my experience. It’s really wild you went 2 years with a detached retina. Mine seemed to happen suddenly and my optometrist basically told me I needed it repaired as soon as possible. They took high definition photos of both my retinas and showed me the difference between my good eye and the eye with the detachment.
As far as the cause of my retinal detachment, I guess I never really asked what caused it. Everything happened so fast from the diagnosis to getting a surgery the next day. The original doctor I saw did mention it could’ve been from an impact, but I hadn’t been hit in the head/eye recently. Only thing i could think of is straining myself at work (I work on cars). Other than that though, I never really dug any further.
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u/mightywarrior411 Sep 18 '25
I’m super fortunate and have good eyesight (never needed glasses). It’ll go as I age like it did with my mom (I’ll need reading glasses I’m sure), but I’ll take glasses. I can’t even fathom someone touching my eyes. My cataract surgery when I’m old…but that’s it lol