I got my first pair of glasses at age 10, and my vision got much worse over the following fifteen years. I alternated between contacts and glasses until April 2019, when I took the plunge: I got LASIK.
And it has been the best purchase I have ever made.
I know that’s a big claim, but it’s true. To wake up every day and be able to see perfectly (actually, a little better than perfectly in my right eye) is not something I take for granted, especially when I look at all the other ways it’s benefited my life – like travel.
For example, these things are no longer on my packing list:
- Contacts. I usually wore dailies, so packing these involved counting out one contact per eye per day of the trip with a few extra, just in case one ripped or fell out of my eye.
- Contact case. In the event I needed to hold on to a pair of contacts for a little longer than one day, like when I went to sleep on the plane, this was a requirement.
- Saline solution. A not-so-fun game I have played on several occasions: how many 3 oz. bottles of saline solution can be stuffed into my Ziploc bag with all your my other lotions and potions?
- Glasses. Because when I wasn’t wearing my contacts, as was often the case on travel days, I still needed to be able to see where I was going.
My toiletry bag has never seemed so roomy!
I really appreciated not needing all those eye supplies in the tiny cabin!
Outside of packing, it’s wonderful to not have to worry about falling asleep on a plane, train, etc.. I would either guarantee dry, red eyes if I fell asleep with my contacts in – dry plane air doesn’t help the situation – or place my glasses in the seat back pocket, hoping that I didn’t accidentally crush them in my sleep and that I would be able to find them when I woke up. With LASIK, this is never a concern. I can just fall asleep en route to my destination without a care in the world (so long as I have my Cabeau neck pillow).
Plus, I feel much more confident taking pictures on travel days. I love capturing all the memories, but I have never loved how I looked in glasses, or how I looked when I forced contact lenses into dry, tired eyes.
I know that LASIK can seem scary, but the actual process is very quick and shows its value almost immediately. For me, the surgery took under ten minutes for both eyes, and in my memories, it just feels very dreamy (to be fair, they had given me a sedative). I took a nap right after surgery, and then my vision was practically perfect the next morning when I went in for a checkup – I was cleared to drive without correction. Just make sure you talk to your eye doctor and do your research into credible providers. I had my LASIK done at a TLC Laser Eye Center, after being referred there by my optometrist, and I would highly recommend them.
I will likely need reading glasses in the future, but until then, I look forward to plenty more trips with perfect vision.