My Bionic Eye - Cataract Surgery 1

Today was the day for the BIG LEAP - lens replacement surgery to replace a cataract lens in my left eye.  This is by far the scariest surgery I have experienced, since my eyesight is at stake!
I arrived at the surgery center at 8 and was informed that the doctor was ahead of schedule and was waiting for me.  Imagine that, a doctor waiting for a patient.  There was no waiting for me - I was expedited through the paperwork while a nurse put drops into my eyes and then whisked into pre-op.  The doctor met me there for a brief final discussion on which lens I would choose.  He recapped what we discussed previously about Crystalens and I confirmed that I would stay with my original decision for Crystalens.  After donning the surgical garb and getting poked and prodded a bit, I was wheeled into the the operating room.
For anesthesia, I was given lidocaine in the eye and a mild drip of versed, not enough to knock me out, but just to calm me down.  I really could not tell whether it was working, but I guess it did.

The surgery began by them taping over my eye to keep it still, then I was instructed to stare at the overhead light.  Once he started working on my eye, my sight and memory became a bit blurry.  I recall the sensation of pressure and motion on and around my eye and I kept staring at the lights, which had turned into to marshmallow-looking shapes on a black background that kept moving around - all sort of abstract.  Then he said something about inserting the lens and the shapes changed.  I could see something moving across my field vision - it looked sort of clear, but fuzzy.  Then it was all over.

In recovery, my left eye was feeling scratchy and watering a lot.  When I opened it, everything was pretty blurry, but colors seemed much brighter and vibrant that what I could see with my right eye.

I was on my way home by 10am.  On the way home, we stopped at the opthalmologist's office to get a contact lens for my right eye, so that my vision would be balanced when I drove back to the office tomorrow for my post-op visit.

The rest of the day I spent at home, resting.  My eye felt scratchy most of the afternoon and watered a lot, even through the evening.  The vision quality in the left eye is still quite blurry.  I can see well for distance vision, but there is a double image or ghosting effect that makes everything blurry.  This is one of the many possible side effects to the surgery that "should" go away over time.  I certainly hope so, because it is very annoying.

When I went outside at night, I noticed that the halos around streetlights and headlamps are different now.  Instead of a consistent halo/starburst circle around lights, I am now seeing irregular shapes (like a badly drawn circle) around the lights - I am guessing this is another manifestation of ghosting.

Its very disconcerting now, but I am trying to stay positive that this will all go away after a good nights rest to help me recover from the trauma of the surgery.