I need to be more careful as to the kind of stuff I'm putting in my eyes. Is it "in" my eyes or "on" my eyes? Hmmm? I don't know. Either way, I need to be careful as to the kinds of "chemicals", we'll say, that are coming in contact with my eyeballs. There, that's better. Words. Like Gloria Estefan, of Miami Sound Machine fame, once sang, "But the words get in the way".
Anyway, I have a history of dry eyes, stemming from thin corneas. Apparently, two corrective eye surgeries will do that. Some nights, I will utilize a nocturnal eye gel to quell that dryness while I sleep. Last night, I used that eye gel, knowing full well that some mornings, it can be hard to wash away all that gel residue. Still, I'm usually more than willing to battle cleaning off that residue in the morning, if it means that I'm able to sleep comfortably the night before. Truth be told, I slept well enough last night after having used the eye gel.
This morning when I woke up, my right eye hurt and had the redness to accompany the minor pain I was experiencing. This sort of discomfort is not new. I thought I had cleaned off most of the residue during my morning shower, but maybe I didn't, because for a good chunk of the morning, not only did that same eye continue to bother me, but I had many coworkers tell me that my right eye was really red. Not that I didn't believe them, but I had to take a look for myself.
This made me venture to the men's room, which for much of the last few days, always smells like marijuana when you walk through the door. I can't explain why in the hell the men's room smells that way, but if you're asking me, I'm blaming security. One of them is responsible for that scent. Has to be.
Once in the front of the mirror, I finally saw what everyone else had apparently saw.
My right eye was red. Red as hell. Looked like I was the one smoking weed. It looked bad. Bloodshot. Like I did not sleep a wink last night. The discomfort was mild at this point, but the red eye was clearly a concern. I didn't want to walk around the office with a red eye. That's not a good look and I was wearing blue today, so that red would have clashed with my outfit.
I think I spent nearly every 30 minutes hitting the eye drops, trying to get that red out. I did not use Visine, by the way. I used this brand of eye drop called "Blink". It comes in a pretty light blue bottle. This is a thicker eye drop and I've found it to be pretty soothing. Most days anyway. The fact that it took me most of the morning to finally get rid of that redness was bothersome and frankly, I shouldn't have asked those drops to work that hard.
For whatever the reason, the redness came back in the afternoon. I was done. No more drops for me. Fuck it. I called it a day, packed up my stuff, and went home. As I write this, the red had gone down a bit. Now it just looks like I was just coming home tired, which for most days, is pretty accurate. I do come home tired. I work long days. I work with people I can't stand. The mental and emotional drain is very, very real.
So, upon further investigation, I may have figured out why my eyeballs, the right one especially, were mildly sore and red today. In tossing out that nocturnal eye gel, I just so happened to notice that that damn eye gel was expired. I need to be more attentive to those kinds of details, when stuff expires. Food expires and I don't eat that. Milk expires and I don't drink that. Nocturnal eye gel expires. Sure, let's put that in both eyes. I won't be tasting the gel. Why not? I did sleep comfortably though.
That eye gel expired all the way back in 2022. In April, maybe? Not that it matters really.
I suppose I should be grateful that I'm not blind. Of course, I'll take acute redness, or even severe redness really, over blindness any day. I think most of us would.
I'll admit that doing such a thing is pretty stupid, using considerably expired eye gel. I own it. I have to. I was the one who did it. I'm a dumbass.
At this point, the eyeballs are still healing. My left eye feels okay and pretty much has felt fine for most of the day. That right one still kind of hurts, but it's not a crippling pain. It'll be fine.
I'll be fine.
Loading comments...