So last Thursday (5/11) I woke up with some redness in my right eye. Not tremendously unusual, but it didn't go away as the day went on and by late afternoon I started having some pain in my eye socket/temple area (almost like a sinus headache). I also had some serious light sensitivity.
By the time I got home from work, my eye doctor's office was closed, so the wife suggested one of these online doctors (which was a very pleasant experience - I highly recommend). My usual MO is "wait and see what happens - it will get better", but this felt different. Anyway, the online doc was concerned and suggested I call my eye doctor's after-hours number and if I couldn't reach them to go to the emergency room. (?!?!)
Really?
So, I leave a message with my eye doctor's office and he calls me back Thursday evening and after hearing my story asks if I can meet him at his office before they open in the morning. I'm like..."uhh...yeah, sure".
Turns out I have iritis in my right eye. Inflammation of the fluid around the iris. Mine was "Stage 4+" and my iris had already "stuck" to my lens. By Saturday, my right eye was essentially useless. So cloudy I couldn't see out of it. One week later and hundreds of dollars of steroid drops, dilation drops and pressure-reducing drops later I am returning to normal but am not out of the woods yet.
Moral of the story (and something new I learned) - take any sort of pain in the eye seriously. As I've learned more about this, pain/light sensitivity in the eye is never good and if not caught early, can have serious consequences (like loss of sight).
Here's a pic from the afternoon of 5/12 when it actually looked pretty good (it looked like something out of a horror flic that morning):
