Eyelid Bumpies...Or Something

My eyes have been bothering me off and on for two months. It's been really obnoxious, sometimes painful, and has left me in a state of wearing my glasses almost exclusively. I hate my glasses. They're about eight years old and the prescription is wrong.

To make an incredibly long story short, the pediatrician said I had viral conjunctivitis. No, I do not regularly see a pediatrician but Garrett's doctor's appointment just happened to coincide with the first signs that something was wrong with my eyes. She said it would run its course. The general physician, about a month later, said that since it hadn't gone away, it was probably bacterial conjunctivitis and he put me on an antibiotic. Today I saw an optometrist and, after an extensive eye exam, was told I have upper eyelid conjunctivitis. I've never even heard of this before and, apparently, it is exclusive to contact lens wearers. Nifty.

She flipped my eyelids up (I shudder just thinking about it) and determined that there are bumps covering them. These, obviously, become irritated by the chunk of plastic in my eye and rebel by producing mass amounts of eye discharge, also known as sleep, eye boogers, puss, etc. She gave me a prescription for an anti-inflammatory eye drop and said she'd see me in two weeks.

Well, she actually said that someone else would see me in two weeks. Today was her last day. This made me very upset because I really liked her. Part of the reason that I let this little problem go so long without seeing an eye doctor is because I hate finding new people. I still have my hair done by the same woman who has done it since I was seven. Yes, she lives in Ramona. Yes, that means I only get my hair done when I am in San Diego. If I had the same health insurance I would probably try to plan illnesses so that I could keep all my same doctors. But I sucked it up and got myself an optometrist in Utah and she went and had today be her last day. But her other office is downtown so I'm considering just following her there. It's not like I typically have eye problems that last for two months. It's not like I can't drive downtown in the event that I need my eyes looked at.

Anyway. So I had the full on eye exam. I had the full on blast your eyeballs with air. I had the full on dilation so that she could make sure that the rest of my eye looked okay, lids not withstanding. Problem is, I didn't have any sunglasses with me. Note to self: Never, ever, leave home without your sunglasses. Ever, ever. Because this is what will happen to you.

I had to slip hideous fake sunglass thingies behind my actual glasses to drive home. This in and of itself would not be so terrible. Terrible, yes, but not so terrible. What was so terrible was the fact that I had to take the prescription to WalMart. I had to walk from my car to the doors of WalMart looking like this. And then I had to walk back. I kid you not. And people were, indeed, staring at me. And I was thinking that the world might just come to an end right then and there on account of the fact that my own level of humiliation was enough to send it spinning off of its axis.