That Delete Button: choices

Laser Eye Surgery - Round Two

August 16, 2016

So, as you know from my last post, I was ready to have my eyes lasered until I was told that I wasn't going to have the procedure I'd initially thought I could. That's when it all went a bit pants up!

I sat there for a while wondering how I'd make it back into the surgery because I was freaked out enough the first time round and they wanted me to come again?! Did they have any idea how nerve-wracking the first attempt was? But I hadn't planned to be off that long and I had made plans to do things too so I would have to go back, there was not much space to budge really.

So I went back in two weeks later armed with appropriate time off work. The second time round was much quicker than the first - they didn't need to do all of the tests as they had already done them the last round. So I was called into the surgery area and spoke to the surgeon and the nurses and then was told to wait in the waiting room till I was called. This was a smaller room where a few patients who ere also here for laser eye surgery were seated.

Whilst there, I met a girl who lived very near to me! What a coincidence!!! I talked to her and her mum and it was actually really lovely- we joked about how we could have driven in together. Unfortunately I didn't get her name so I haven't heard from her since but I'm sure she's ok. Maybe I'll run into her at some point who knows!

Meeting someone who lived close to me really helped - it felt like time went a bit faster as I was called into the operating room. There I met the nurse who would be with me and then, after we introduced ourselves, they made me lie down to begin the procedure. They began by numbing my eyes and it didn't hurt at all.

After a few rounds of the numbing drops, the surgeon came in the room to perform the procedure. He explained exactly what would happen and what to expect and he explained it all again as he did it. I found this was, oddly, comforting as he talked through the whole process with me. It made me less nervous and I was quite amazed.

Basically, what they did (if you are squeamish skip this paragraph):

- numb the eye,
- clamp it open (it didn't hurt and neither was it really uncomfortable)
- put a pool of solution onto of the eye to loosen the top layer of my eye
- wipe the top layer off
- laser the eye
- wash out the eye with really cold water stuff
- insert bandage contact lense (it's just a clear contact lenses)
- cover the eye and do the same to the next one.

I'm actually really weird so I was sat through this thinking 'HOW COOL IS THAT?!' - I often find myself doing this, I think it's one of my coping mechanisms.

Then, once done - it took about fifteen minutes to do both eyes, I was shown what drops to take when and then I was ready to go. That was it!! I was all done.

This part was unreal because I could actually see pretty well despite having surgery done on my eyes, but as we walked to the car, I could barely keep my eyes open - they just closed themselves. So once in the car I let them close.

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assembly

Intentions

June 24, 2015

Ok, so I have a confession to make...I've been avoiding blogging for a while. Well, for about two weeks. See, the thing is, I thought that now my Inspired By Random series is over, what should I do? It was as if I needed more inspiration and whatever I came up with just wasn't good enough. And then I thought I could write something about Ramadan because its currently Ramadan but still, total mind blank. I just kept hitting a brick wall and it was so ANNOYING!!

I still haven't really got an idea I'm happy with, but I do have one for todays post.

Yesterday, I went to a talk and it was somewhat along the lines of intentions. This reminded me of the first and last assembly that was given to us every year during secondary school. Yep, you read right, each school year at the beginning and at the end, the head would have an assembly on the importance of intentions (it worked obviously).

Our head stressed that every time we go into something, whether it be education, making choices, even when doing things for people, we should look at what our intentions are. Why are we doing this? I've found that this does help. I think it's really really important, from both a religious and a non-religious perspective, that we go into things knowing our intentions. Intentions do make a difference.

See, if we know our intention from the beginning, it's as if we know what foot to start with, we aren't hesitating and wavering, we know what it means to us. It definitely helps to find out what is important to us and what isn't. An example - a very simple example - is clothes. Are you deicing to wear that for yourself or is it for another reason? Then, are you comfortable with your answer? Knowing this from the beginning adds meaning to our actions and it means we can say "screw this" or "no way, this matters to me" because we know, personally what our intentions were before we started. It matters.

So, have you taken a look at your intentions recently?

P.S. you can still add your link to the Inspired By Random: Book Titles series!!

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A New Use for 'Blah'

June 14, 2015

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advice

Dear 18 Year Old Self,

February 22, 2015

Five things I would tell my 18 year old self…

At a tender age of 18, there was a lot going on in my life! I made some decisions like what course to apply to for further study, got my first job, learnt to drive and passed my exams to get into further study – see, I did say a lot!

But there are always things we did that we could have done differently – there always will be because the way I see it, that’s life. The ability to have a choice means that there will always be a ‘what if’ situation faced at some point!

Anyway, here are five things I would tell to my 18 year old self!

1. Stay open-minded: I personally think that being open-minded allows us to explore more in terms of ideas, ways of thinking and the way we do things. It allows us to see things in ways we may not have even considered before.

2. Embrace your differences – we are all unique and this is not a bad thing. There was a time that I wished I was the same as everyone else and, even though I know now that we are all unique, I wish I realised this earlier. It would have made some of my experiences much more pleasant!

3. You are allowed to like something even if someone else close to you doesn’t. Ok, so this ties in with the above point but I’ve decided that it deserves a space of its own. My taste in clothes, shoes, bags and pretty much everything has always been different from my cousins and some of my friends. When I was younger and I would ask for their opinions, say clothes for example, if they didn’t like it they would say ‘it’s very you’ (they still do this very often). I quickly learnt that ‘it’s very you’ actually means ‘I don’t like it but then I don’t like what you like,’ and often when this was the reply, I would put that item of clothing or whatever it was back. I wish then that I knew it was ok not to like what they liked. It is ok.

4. You know what you want to do; you always have and don’t forget it! At the time I couldn’t think of what I wanted to do in my life, but looking back now I realise I’ve always know. I’ve known since junior school when my work was displayed in one of the corridors – it was a proud moment for me. :)

5. It gets better – it has to.

And there it is; five things I’d tell my eighteen year old self. What would you tell yourself?

Disclaimer: point number one is a personal opinion and the credibility of this idea is somewhat questionable, therefore do not use it as a reference unless you, yourself, feel the same way/have a credible source.