The post-op process is interesting. The next day you end up in the waiting room with other miserable victims, all wearing silly looking dark "happy glasses". These are the dorky looking shades which completely cover your eyes. You aren't allowed to shower for several days and you are given drugs to help you get through the pain while your epithelial cells grow over the surface of your eye again.

Recovery Phase 1: Epithelia Regrowth
This growth period takes about three days. Those of you who have experienced very bad contact lens days probably won't find these three days all that bad. You are given drugs to help you get through the process in any case -- though some are optional and you are only to use them if you do find the pain to be an issue. Everyone is different and some people find the recovery period fairly painful at first.

You wouldn't believe how intense normal things are after the surgery is done. Yes, I was foolish to do it, but just trying to look at a computer screen was nearly impossibe! It's so bright, your eyes water, you can't see clearly, it's just plain painful. Also, you have to get a whole boatload (only a little at a time) of drops into your eyes and it's tough prying them open to do it. It seems the eyes have developed a sense of distrust for some reason, go figure.

Recovery Phase 2: Corneal Healing
On the third day you get your bandage lenses out. These were prescriptionless contact lenses worn on the eyes to cover them while the epithelial layer grows back. They give you a quick vision test, and tell you that you can now resume normal activities, which thankfully includes showers.

Everyone is different, so healing speeds and visual improvements move along at different speeds. I was still worrying about my eyes for many weeks. Though I could see much better with uncorrected vision than I could before, I was certainly nowhere near able to see as well as I could when I had worn lenses. So, I just put in my drops, looked for changes, and hoped I keep seeing improvements. This was not a happy time.

It was strange, but after about a month, when they took me off the steroidal anti-anflammatory, my eyes finally started to heal up. I couldn't help but wonder if the good nutrition combined with the medicine kept my body from creating enough of an inflammatory response to heal the lenses quickly? However, I believe this is just the normal recovery period. It takes time for the eyes to adapt to the trauma of laser surgery.

Post Recovery: Three Months After
After three months had gone by, I had recovered to 20/20 vision. It is probably just a tiny bit better than that, but I'm not going to quibble. The doctor wrote up a statement that I take to the drivers license people so that I can get my "corrective eyewear" stipulation removed from my license. While I am very happy indeed, I still reach for my glasses every morning when I wake up.

I have a relatively inactive blog about my laser surgery and recovery if you are interested...

Addendum: Dry Eyes
I find now that I am prone to suffer from dry eyes. It is a common side effect of PRK surgery. Having done some research it appears that omega-3's (fish oil) can help alleviate this. However, I only really suffer from dry eyes when I don't get enough sleep or stare at a computer screen for far too long. One of these days maybe I'll stop doing that. In the mean time, I think I'll pick up some eye drops and see if they help.

For more (formal) information, see the Wikipedia entry on dry eyes.