Thanksgiving Adventures of the Eye Sort

My eyes have this thing for Thanksgiving time. I swear it. They sense its coming, and WHAM an eye injury pops up like it was coordinated or something. Its becoming a serious problem, I tell you. 

I'm sure most of you remember my last Thanksgiving Eye Catastrophe which ended in me getting two stitches in my eyelid and rocking a lovely black eye the first time I met my (at the time unbeknownst to me future) in-laws. Well, this time around I have an eye issue of entirely different nature.

Probably about a month ago now, I noticed I had some slight loss of my inner peripheral vision of my right eye that is the vision from the center of my eye towards my nose. I got an eye doctor appointment where it was confirmed that I had significant vision loss and was referred to a specialist with various potential diagnoses ranging from a blood clot/stroke of the eye to an aneurysm or a tumor of some sort. Just a little terrifying. I went to the retinal specialist a few days later and was finally given a concrete answer which thankfully included none of the above. I had a detached retina in my right eye which was the reason for my vision loss. The doctor even thought that it might have been a problem long before I noticed it because unfortunately there was already scar tissue and the macula - the center of the retina - had also detached. 

After surgery - looking rough...

Long story short, I had to have surgical repair of my eye on Monday with a procedure called a Scleral Buckle where they place a band of sorts around the eye to press the retina up close to the eye again or something like that. (In the interest of full disclosure, do not youtube this procedure unless you enjoy nasty surgeries. I just watched the first few moments and now realize why it looks like someone ground off the outer layer of my eye. Only made it through the first 20 seconds and decided that was enough education for me for now on my still slightly nauseous stomach.) Anyway, I had surgery on Monday under general anesthesia and apparently things went well. I am still in recovery mode and my vision is still very blurry, but I am hopeful that by the time I have my follow-up appointment on Tuesday I will be doing much better. Namely, because I am sure to go crazy from being stuck in the apartment for long periods of time with nothing to do. Normally, I would try to get my craft on during this time, but of course this is limited by my lack of vision  (my depth perception is dangerous to all involved) and the fact that pain meds make me feel terribly nauseous. So instead, I am limited to mostly sitting around, mostly listening to television as straining my eye for long periods of time is no good, and being bored. Not as appealing as it may sound.

Luckily, before all this non-fun junk occurred, Kevin and I had a couple visitors here in Michigan - Turtle in October and Annie in November. We went out to all our favorite places in Michigan and some new ones too:

•  The Mega Mall - a huge warehouse like building chock full of antiques and junk where Turtle and I each got our own vintage aprons
• SugarBerry - our favorite frozen yogurt by the ounce establishment 
• The Daily Scoop - the local downtown ice cream shop 
• Lake Michigan - my first trip as well as Annie's...it was crazy rough water!
• The Twisted Rooster - a delicious restaurant we found that uses local produce and food to make uber delicious food
• MSU vs U of M Hockey Game - another first for me (and we actually won!)

Who would like to come hang out with the McCulloughs and check out probably most of the above locations because that's about all I know of what to do in Michigan as of yet? Just shoot me a text, email, letter, postcard, or fax and I'll get you all booked! The only requirement is you have to be willing to lead around the one eyed hostess at all public events.