Thursday, August 05, 2004

WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS VISUALLY DISGUSTING PHOTOS OF HUMAN BODY PARTS.

Disaster picked a perfect day.

Monday was the day when I planned to give Maui her knitted blouse that I bought from Baguio. I prepared the bag of Benguet coffee that I was hoping to give Miss Emmie because she said she loved its rich aroma. I’ve also neatly packed my accessories that I thought would go well with my blouse.

It was supposedly a day for sticking to routines of waking up early to drive through Jollibee for my breakfast meal, eat it while driving, and then arrive in Powersmash before Ate Vangie does.

In the court where we loved so much, we greeted old badminton friends and got acquainted with Smash old-timers.

A group of players asked Ate Vange and I to play doubles with them. I was paired to a better player because Ate Vange is better than me.

One moment my partner was doing all the scoring, the next minute I was running after the shuttlecock (in the wrong manner, I might add) and his racquet hit my face.

And that’s where the nightmare begun.

It could’ve happened in a fraction of a second but everything was in slow motion to me. My eyeglasses gave out and it shattered into a thousand fine pieces. I felt shards of glasses in my hands as it scattered, I felt them hit my face, and I felt some of them fly directly into my right eye. I felt each piece as it embedded itself into my eye. I felt the scraping when I closed my lid. I felt the blood slowly falling from my eye.

My big mistake was I rubbed my eyes (the way you usually do when dust gets into it). But thank God, I regained some sense and stopped before I made further damage.

I kept my eyes closed, wishing for someone to tell me what to do. I was imagining them calling an ambulance to take me to the nearest hospital. I was thinking, “Oh my God, I’ll be blind! Please God no!”

Somebody took my hand and walked directed me out of the warehouse. His hands were so soft and assuring that I couldn’t help but squeeze them hard. He asked me if I could open my eyes, I told him I don’t want to open them. I asked him if I’ll be blind and in a commanding and assured manner he said that I will not.

The moment he said that, we finally stepped out of the warehouse and my eyes felt the light. The moment was oddly comforting and assuring. I knew I was going to be alright. I gave thanks to God for quickly sending my guardian angel to hug me. Ate Vange quickly found her way into my right side.

But divine intervention or no, walking with your eyes all-bloody is not something that’ll give you any peace of mind. So I was frantic again. I asked my guide for the nth time, “Will I go blind?”

And he also answered,firmly, for the nth time “No you will not”.

While Ate Vange kept asking the guy where is he taking me, why are we not hailing a cab, my car is parked right outside the building why can’t we just use it. My guide answered her when he asked me to carefully take four steps.

Then Ate Vange exclaimed, “Oy good, Philhealth accredited!”

Another surprising turn of events was an eye clinic was located beside the warehouse. So I was seated in a chair in no time. I finally found humor in the situation when I felt lots of eyes trained on me.

I said to myself, “What a sight I must be!” I was wondering whether I soaked my shirt with blood, whether half of my face was covered with blood, or whether I looked like the girl from “The Eye”.

I wanted to scream to Ate Vange “Ate Vangie, hurry take some photos. When this is all over, I want to see me.”

Of course I didn’t. I couldn’t. That would be most inappropriate. It was a serious moment deserving a serious reaction, especially from the victim.

But I couldn’t help it, I laughed so hard. Suddenly everything became so hilariously funny, the doctors, the guy who brought me there, Ate Vangie hissing her breath. If the shards did not remind me that I was still very much injured I would’ve kept on laughing.

I also kept reassuring everybody around me that I was going to be fine, not to worry that I’m still in shock to feel any pain.

But when the doctor pried my eyes open, I couldn’t help but ask again, will I go blind?

“No, you won’t,” he said. “Do you see any flashes of lights?”

“No.”

“How about floating objects. Any floating objects?”

“No. What floating objects? Am I supposed to see them?” I asked stupidly, because I was preparing myself for the worst.

“No, that means you’re going to be fine.”

The guide who brought me there introduced himself as the son of another doctor who resides there. My partner introduced himself as a good friend of another opthalmologist there. After everybody got acquainted with everybody, they asked to sit in this machine that checks the eyes.

I could feel involuntary tears running from my eyes. I was hoping they were tears because I didn’t even want to think about it if they were blood.

Doctor said that they will wait for another specialist who will perform the operation on me. So I sat there, maybe for an hour or so, bloody in one corner, waiting for the good doctor to arrive.

When he did, he attended to another guy first who got his eyedrop stuck between his eyes. His situation, obviously, means that he’s plight was direr than mine.

When they finally got me into a blue gown, they made me sit in a dental chair lookalike. The nurse read my waiver, then she asked me to sign it. She chatted me for awhile, then asked me about my work.

I lied to her and told her that I have low tolerance for pain, so she better give me lots of anesthesia. I liked her a lot after that because she gave me regular drops of Alcaine (it’s the eye equivalent of Novocaine).

Being inside the operating room was very surreal for me. I was conscious all the time. The doctor and I chatted about badminton like we were sharing a good cup of coffee in Starbucks instead of being inside the operating room.

I could see the bright lights above me, I feel the doctor’s tools as it scrape the glasses from my eyes. Whenever forceps were mentioned I would go… “Oh no! What for?”

I could hear my doctor complaining about some of the glasses penetrating my second lascera. I didn’t know what the hell he meant by that, but I knew it was bad news. I could hear his occasional, “tsk tsk, andami naman!” I found out later that he had to take out 30 microscopic pieces from my eyes.

I felt him as he “irrigated” (blasted jets of water) into my eyes. I saw the nylon-like thread for the sutures. He had to perform four.

After the operation, the doctor said I was very lucky because the shards where nowhere near my pupil, else I’d be blind.

Yes, Doctor Doom may not be the most comforting of all doctors but at least he knew what to do with his hands. After the operation they made me wear Cyclops goggles. The said goggles became my bestfriend even when I slept.

After the operation, the Alcaine wore off and the shock was no longer there to help me deal with the pain. And it was painful. Tears were overflowing but not because I willed them. I had to close my eyes because the wounds inside them were smarting. Even the sunlight was unbearable.

So what’s the lesson of this event in my life? Wear polycarbonate lenses when you engage in a sports activity.

***originally wrote this last Monday night in Verdana, font size 24. It was useless to post it then because to read the letters in the screen meant my lips kissing it. I’m fine now. Really, no permanent damage, sutures will be taken out this Saturday, and in two weeks’ time the redness will be gone. Okay, I was not as lucky as I thought I would be. My astigmatism just increased from 100 to 200. Phew!***

Blog roll

affliations

many thanks to

Thursday, August 05, 2004

0 Comments: