>>64874380Yeah, laser retinal surgery can be really rough if you're not lucky. Some sources of struggle include:
1) The numbing agent (probably alcaine) is given at a low concentration due to being harmful for the eyes in large doses.
2) your retina is at the BACK of your eye, so in all honesty the numbing drops are mostly to make you less likely to blink/move your eye during the surgery than anything. (which is why you likely had drops applied to both eyes and not just the one they did surgery on)
3) The length and intensity of the procedure is WILDLY different dependent on your condition. A small tear can be done in like, two minutes. Larger tears will take multiple 5-10 minute sessions over months.
4) There is a significant variance in the sensitivity of the nerves at the back of the eye to pain. Some people genuinely won't feel a thing (regardless of age/gender) and some people need to be physically held in place because the pain makes them squirm.
It's way better than the alternative used for more extreme cases (jamming 3 holes into the eye, draining all the eye jelly, using the 3 holes as ports to jam tools into to stitch up the back of the eye, refilling the gas to keep it inflated and then patching the three holes), but the fact that you're awake instead of sedated sucks ass, especially if you're nervous. At our clinic we always give water or juice to laser patients just so they can chill out for a bit after the procedures.
