Seeing and Believing

Today has been a great day so far. I had an appointment with my eye doctor in Salt Lake this morning. My wonderful father-in-law, Larry, drove me (as usual) to SLC. This time, we had my two youngest boys with us, which was a whole new adventure. :) We brought Casen's remote control car and a bag of cookies, so the boys were set for the long wait in the lobby. Tolan met us there and the two of us went into meet with the doctor while Grandpa Brown stayed with the little boys.

The boys had a great time in the waiting room. They ran the car under chairs, down hallways and almost through the legs of some patients (oops). When we came out, they had chocolate on their faces and had no signs of being bored or upset by the wait. I will have to remember this for next time. :)


The doctor looked at my eye again, and told us both the good and bad news.

Good: My cornea is nearly completely recovered from all the damage it received in the early months of my paralysis! I have learned how to manage and take care of my eye (ie. I wear my patch) so it has allowed time for healing and prevented further damage. Hooray!

More Good: My lower eyelid is finally settling into place, with the collagen implant now resting up against my eye (as opposed to hanging out, which it was doing until a few weeks ago). Yeah!


Bad: My eyesight and depth perception are still off because of my inability to blink. The blinking motion is quite complex. Apparently, the blink (when watched in slow motion) occurs from the outside of the eye, into the inner part of the eye, next to the nose. This motion acts as a "squeegee" and it pushes fluids (ie. tears, goop) and gets it to the drainage "pipes" that rest underneath our inner eyes. Since I can't blink, the fluid continues to build up and rest in the center of my eye. You can actually see the liquid build up pooled on my lower lid. So, I am constantly looking through liquid, which is why my eyesight and perception are off.


Sadly, we can't do anything about this but give my eye time for the nerves to regenerate and hopefully start up the blinking motion again.

More Good News: However, there are products on the market to help people in my situation. There are sun glasses that come with "Moisture Chambers" built in, meaning, they actually create a little "seal" against your face, so the wind, debris, etc. cannot get into your eye. So, even though the eye doesn't blink, it is protected and kept moist, thus alleviating a few of the problems from not blinking.


A little trip to the Optical Center, and $120 later, I have new glasses that I can wear while I am driving or outside and they will protect my eye! (This isn't 100% foolproof, but much better than using just the eye patch all the time. The patches will still be used indoors when minimal protection is needed.)


So, my face may still be crooked (though Tolan thought the glasses were crooked :), but at least the glasses fit me and protect my eye. Tolan says I won't be setting any fashion or style trends, but I can go out and face "the elements" and that is awesome! Check them out!

As for my other good news, we have been working with the U Hospital and the insurance to get our bills figured out and paid. We have had one bill left, for $7,500 that has been disputed over and over again. The hopsital was ready to turn it over to collections. Our insurance told us not to pay it, but the hospital said to pay it. Ugh. Today, I got a wonderful call from the hospital rep and she told me they are going to waive this final bill!! We don't have to pay it, and neither does our insurance! In looking at our file, she doesn't know why we received a mysterious "discount" on our bill, but since it is there, she was able to waive this and count it as part of the discount...the discount we shouldn't have gotten, but is somehow there! So, they dropped a total of $30,000 (incluing the $7,500) from bill! WOW! Blessings and miracles!

All in all, a great day so far! Now, with my new, fancy glasses, I am going to go outside and work in my garden! Thanks for all the prayers. I have no doubt the prayers have created the blessings and miracles!