Today started at 10 AM with a visit to Dr. Kazim to assess the healing of Thomas's eye socket. It appears fully healed now. There are a few dissolvable stitches still holding on that Dr. Kazim would liked to have removed. Thomas was a bit anxious about it, and after discussing it with the ocularist we were scheduled to see later in the day, it was decided that just leaving them alone was fine. Our next appointment with Dr. Kazim will now be after the prosthetic eye is in place.
Thomas was apprehensive about seeing the ocularist for the first time. Although all the nerves in and around the eye were removed when the eye socket was removed, he does have sensations now in both his eyelids and inside the eye. Sometimes he describes these as "weird" and sometimes as "painful". He's been reluctant to let anything touch him around the area of the eye socket. He has been anxious because he knows that the process of creating and fitting a prosthetic is going to involve a great deal of manipulation of the area.
We met the ocularist, Christine Cantelmo, at 1:30. She spent the first ten to fifteen minutes simply talking with Thomas, asking him about his eye, talking with him about what she was going to do, and answering his questions so that he'd be comfortable. Christine was wonderful and Thomas seemed to really like her. She explained to him that today the only thing she would be doing would be to fit him with a temporary prosthetic. The main purpose of this is to have him wear it for several weeks to become accustomed to having a prosthetic in the eye socket. She explained to him that the temporary prosthesis wouldn't fit the socket or match the other eye perfectly, but Thomas seemed very excited about it nonetheless. He was especially excited that he was going to have an eye there for an upcoming trip to Ritina's parents.
The first prosthetic she brought out was obviously too small and she indicated that she picked it that way on purpose. She wanted Thomas to get the feel of having something slipped under the eyelids and into the eye socket, but she wanted to start with something easy. Thomas was as brave as he's ever been. He was truly scared, there is no question. He grabbed my hand, though, and stayed perfectly still while she inserted it. He did say that it hurt some, but I personally believe it was not nearly the horrible experience he was anticipating. The little prosthetic looked quite hilarious, and Thomas himself laughed when she gave him a mirror to look at it. He built his courage back up and let her remove it, again with tight grip on my hand.
She returned with a larger prosthetic that appeared about the same size as his real left eye, and to me it appeared a remarkable match in color just as it was. Thomas saw that it was larger and it took him a bit longer to build up his courage this time, but he finally said he was ready and Christine slipped it right in. He claimed again that the experience was painful, but he was very pleased with the results. Immediately it filled in the eye area and once again made it appear that there is an eye in the socket. The sunken look that has existed since the last reconstructive surgery was replaced by a normal round looking appearance.
Because his top eyelid still droops---to be addressed by Dr. Kazim in some minor additional reconstrutive surgeries---the prosthetic actually sits up too high. Christine wanted to remove the prosthesis and reshape it a bit to fit better, but Thomas decided that he'd had enough. She showed him in the mirror how the pupil area of the prosthesis was mostly hidden by his eyelid, and she explained that she could reshape it so that the center of the prosthesis was in the center of his eye opening. Thomas was done with having his eye socket manipulated for today, however, and we both told him how great he'd done and that the prosthesis was wonderful just like it is.
Even this temporary prosthesis that doesn't fit right is a wonderful step for Thomas. He seemed very happy about it today, and personally I have to say that it's already such a remarkable difference; we are all excited about how the real prosthesis (or as Thomas says, his "real fake eye" as opposed to his "fake fake eye") and the final reconstructive steps will turn out.
All in all it was great day for Thomas, and he even had fun riding the train and taking a few taxi trips around New York City. He seems very happy with this first step, and after all he's been through in the past year, it's so wonderful to see him encouraged by something.
Thank you for all your continued thoughts, messages, and prayers.
