I had it done about 12 years ago, around age 35. Lifechanging. Awesome. To echo Milosz, best damn $5k or whatever that I've ever spent. I was seriously myopic, on the order of 20/400 (or maybe there should be another zero?) with astigmatism. The distance I could see without blurriness was about the length of my thumb from my face. Corrected to better than 20/20.
My 3 pieces of advice:
- Get it done at one of those big places that does a million of 'em a year. What I did, I went to the Wilmer eye clinic to get evaluated on whether I would be a good candidate. The doc there told me it was doable for me, but I had a possible issue with corneal thinness(?), so I was only "just" a viable candidate; and maybe only because of then-recent advances(?). But then I had it done at a TLC, with a doc who pretty much just does that.
- Use a health-care expense account to pay for as much of it as you can. That's paying with pre-tax dollars – a big discount.
- Take the Valium.
Doc explained pretty much every aspect of the procedure to me ahead of time. But she didn't tell me that, just before we walked into the operating suite, she was going to lay her hand gently on my forearm, gaze up at me, and coo "Oh, would you like some Valium?" I instinctively went macho, replied with a manner that said "Naw baby, I'll be fine." One of the stupidest decisions I've made in my life. They put a device on your eye that pries your eyelids open and practically extrudes your eyeball, then they do horrible Clockwork Orange shit to your eye. At one point the doc had to stop and say to me quietly, "I really need you to stay still."
If I had known ahead of time she was going to offer me something for anxiety, I would have understood why, and I would have taken it. Don't make the same mistake. Ask ahead of time if they offer anything. (It might be a bad idea to smoke a doob ahead of the procedure – don't the chemicals in that change the fluid pressure in your eye? Used for glaucoma? I wouldn't want to complicate the situation.)
Immediately after the procedure, there was some vision improvement – I could kinda read the clock on the wall – but my cornea was swelling up (as expected) and everything was streaky. It was Friday afternoon: Doc told me to go home, take some Tylenol PM and call it a day. Just go to bed; come in tomorrow for the post-op exam. There were drops, and some lenses to tape over my eye sockets to protect the area. It felt like I had the biggest piece of grit or sand EVER, stuck in each eye, and I couldn't blink it away. And I hated everybody.
The eye irritation had faded a lot by the next day, Saturday. I can no longer put a percent on it, but I seem to remember that I was actually in a pretty good mood when I got to the exam. By the second day after the surgery, Sunday, I could see well enough to drive to the park myself, to take the dog for a long hike. At the time I guesstimated that my vision was about 20/40 or so; maybe not quite that good. That probably sounds bad to some people reading this, but it was kind of a miracle, compared to what my vision had been. Monday morning there was no question – I could drive myself to work quite easily. I had problems the first couple days back at work, in terms of being able to consistently read the computer screen vs papers on my desk. That first day I was constantly moving closer and then further away, adjusting the light, etc. But it got better every day.
It took a while after the surgery for my vision to finally settle down into what it was going to be. It was at least a week, and I kind of think it was more like 3 weeks. The corneal had to heal, and – hell, I don't know what else my eyes were doing. But it was good enough to drive with 2 or 3 days after the surgery, good enough to work with 3 days or so after the surgery, and then there was this long slow improvement period where it seemed like every day I could see a little sharper and better. My vision got so good, that the improvement / fine tuning part seemed to go on for weeks. I don't know if this is an accurate description, but if I started on Sunday at 20/40 or whatever, and I eventually got to 20/15 (just guessing), then it sort of felt like I gained about a "point" almost every day: 20/39, 20/38, 20/37... You can see how at that right, the change keeps going on for over three weeks. But it's very small change, and it's from "usable" to "good" to "very good" to "awesome!", so it was not a problem at all. Just a continual small surprise.
Two other most surprising things were (1) the sensation of breeze on my pupils, after ~25 years of wearing thick glasses (or contacts); and (2) how much more light there was at night, from the moon and the stars. You don't realize just how much light is being blocked/filtered by your thick glasses, until they're gone and you can just see. Moonlit or starry evenings are luminous – I didn't know. Unexpected downside: for the first time I could see while I was taking a shower, and I suddenly realized how filthy my shower stall was. Had to clean it.
My results can't be typical, because I had about the best result imaginable. Lucky, I guess. You probably shouldn't expect a result quite that good. But, man. One bad hour (very bad), and then a dozen great years. Excellent trade off. When I think about how good my result was, I remember that the doc spent a good long time toward the end of the procedure, after all the horrible shit was done, basically taking the smallest squeegee in the world and using it to smooth down my cornea.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LASIK#Operative_procedure
She spent ages doing that, patiently and tirelessly using a "painting" motion to smooth the cornea. Really that part took forever. And I'm so grateful to her now, for her endless patience in that phase. I don't know if that was the secret to the great result, but I'm grateful anyway.
So, the doc told me before the procedure, that around the time I turned 45 or so (about 10 years from the surgery), I would start to need reading glasses. It was inevitable. That has turned out to be true: about 2 years ago I started needing some help. My procedure came with several follow-up checkup appointments, and one of them was 10 years out from the surgery, so I went in for that, to find out just what kind of help I need. Eyes were healthy, but I need "+1.25" readers. Those are the basic readers you can get at the drug store. They come in gradations from +1 (least correction) up to, I don't know, +3 or so. Costco sells them in a 3-pack for under $20. I don't need them all the time. About 2/3 of the time I can read without them just fine, esp if the room is well-lit. I can use my laptop without them. But if the light is bad, or I'm tired, or if the print is extra small (like on labels), then I put on the reading glasses. No big deal.
Let's see, what else should I tell you? I had both eyes done at once, because I'm reckless and stupid. I'm glad I did, because who knows if I would have had the balls to go back again and do the second eye? But it does increase the risk some. And holy god, does it lengthen the time you spend in the operating suite. You spend all that time on one eye, and she's finally done, and there's another eye to do! Agh. I don't really know if the way I did it was the best idea.
I think I hit everything, in this long post. Good luck!