Chalazion Eye Surgery- Yikes!

About 4 months ago I woke up one morning and my left eyelid was totally swollen and tender. I thought it was a bit weird, but thought maybe the new contact lens solution I used might have cause some sort of reaction. I took some Motrin to help with the swelling.

The day before this happened I had fallen asleep with my contacts in for a few hours. When I woke up, my left eye felt really gritty and just weird.

After the swelling went down…

a small, firm bump formed in my upper eyelid close to my eyelashes. I figured it was a stye or something and just applied hot compresses several times a day.

I started researching my eye problem on the internet and soon discovered (diagnosed myself) that it was actually called a chalazion, not a style. A chalazion is basically a blockage of one of the 23 glands located in the eyelid.

After several weeks, I woke up again in the morning with my right eyelid swollen. I now had a matching one on the other eyelid. What fun! I kept doing the hot compresses several times a day. I also added some eyelid scrubs- which actually did help to unplug some material that was stuck.

As I continued to research my eyelid problem on the Internet, I kept reading that these chalazions can go away on their own. My hope was that if I just kept soaking them they would go away.

About 2 months ago, I decided to contact my regular eye doctor to see if there was some simple solution. I kept reading about eye drops that help with chalazions/styes, so I thought that might be the route to go. So I got a prescription for Zylet eye drops. I just put them in my left eye, since at this point it was the biggest and the reddest. Mind you, these little bumps on my eye didn’t really hurt at all.

Well, the Zylet didn’t really do anything, except cost me $50. I had heard about people that put lemon drops in their eyes to get rid of cataracts, so I thought why not try it. Well, I probably won’t have any cataracts now – but those darn chalazions are still hanging on after putting drops of lemon mixed with eye wash solution.

So, I made the dreaded appointment at an opthamologist. It’s not that I am against doctors or medical procedures or anything, it was just the thought of a needle or anything coming at my eye. I’m not a very good eye patient. The eye doctor of course said the best thing was to cut them out.

But I am happy to say that the chalazion surgery went well. I was able to keep my eye closed the whole time and that was the ticket. It hurt a little bit when they gave me the shot, but with my eye closed it was no problem. There was a little bit of pressure when they flipped my eyelid over to open up the gland, but it was totally bearable.

In short, if you have a chalazion that isn’t going away, don’t be afraid to get it cut out. It really wasn’t that bad. My eyelid is still a little swollen today, but it is looking better and better.