This is really more of a journal entry declaring my age than it is a post of entertainment or encouragement.  Feel free to stop reading now.

For more than a decade I’ve gone through our annual healthcare benefits guide the minute it arrives in the mailbox with the hope that our insurance had decided to cover corrective vision surgery.  Each year, I’ve been disappointed.  Several months ago my husband suggested that we just budget for it.  So we did.  And today I had my two-hour evaluation to see if I qualify.

I walked through the doors of the vision center SOOO excited.  I’ve worn contacts and glasses for the last 24 years and as I sat to fill out the stack of forms they gave me all I could think about is that this will be the year I get to open my eyes under water and actually see.  No more getting sand on my contacts at the beach.  No more grasping around on my nightstand for my glasses first thing every morning.  All my dreams of eye-freedom are about to come true.  Hip. Hip. Hooray!

On the last form I find this… “Schedule allowing, would you be interested in undergoing surgery on the same day as your evaluation.  YES  X   NO      Maybe    ” Heck yea!

First three or four tests were done and the tech says that my corneas are thick enough and my vision just bad enough, but not too bad to qualify me for Lasik surgery.  I’m in.  And the doctor’s schedule permitting, I might actually be living out my vision-freedom by the end of the day.

And then… the flippin’ joy stealer doctor comes in and says that she’s going to do a few more tests, but she is fairly certain that having surgery on both of my eyes would be a bad option for me.  Evidently I need bifocals.  Having surgery on both of my eyes would mean that I have to wear prescription reading glasses for reading, driving, using a computer and basically anything else that requires me to actually see.  She recommended that I have Lasik correction done only on my dominant eye and enjoy the benefits of mono-vision.  The premise is that my left eye will be corrected to see distance and my right eye will be left alone so that I can use it to read.  And… I will still get to wear glasses with a prescription for distance in the right lens and a blank left lens.  She then tried to wrap it all up in a pretty package by telling me how much money I will save by only having surgery on one eye.  Thanks, joy-stealer.  I’m so glad your concerned with my bank account.  I’m sure that saved money will make me feel alllll better when I’m laying on the beach this summer wearing my one-eyed glasses.  Thanks alot.

So now, I’m laying on the couch at home, wearing those ridiculous roll-up sunglasses over my crazy dilated eyes, and trying not to puke from the effects of wearing one contact for the past few hours with the hope that I’ll love the idea of mono-vision.

This aging thing…. It kinda sucks.