Well, as for my stats: My contacts are right eye: -2.75; left eye: 2.50. That is from a prescription from one year ago. However, I have had three free consultations for lasik and I have heard numbers of -3 being thrown around and that I am about 20/400 or so. Believe me NO one voluteers any of this info. I had to fight to get that much. I was told I have an insignificant amount of astigmatism. One Doc mumbled something about my cornea being thick enough so I now know that. And I can see for myself that my pupils are large, but when I asked the docs they did not seem to be concerned.

I just turned 45 and so here I am faced with this judgement call of having monovision or just the regular lasik. One doc was a proponant of the mono and the other stood up abruptly and said that that was MY decision and he would not make it for me.(He was a very nice guy, it just surprised me because I still have all these questions.) So I drove home discouraged with all these questions swirling in my head. I can see that these have been addressed here in other fashions, but here are my questions:

1) Without anything...glasses or contacts, I can read, put on makeup, remove an eyelash from my eye, etc just fine right now. If I have the regular lasik performed, would I LOSE that precious close-up eyesight???????

2) If I have monovision so that I don't need to wear glasses for basically/hopefully anything, won't I inevitably need them for reading, etc, in a few years anyway??? Therefore, why sacrifice the sharp long distance vision?

Ugh, ugh. Yes, I was given some contacts to check out the monovision...but even that appeared to be a crap shoot...For one thing, with my contacts in, I am starting to notice that I cannot focus perfectly as with no contacts in. Yet, with my glasses on, I can still read quite well. I am not quite to that putting them on your forehead stage as Dr. Tannen describes it. So, I'm not so sure how great this contact lens mono trial will be. I just received them and have not had a chance to try them out. I have a tentative surgery date set for Dec 23, but that is NOT with the Doc who gave me the contacts to try. This is with the Doc who thought monovision was very good for me regardless. He did not offer up any contacts to try. He seems very good, but he took me over to his office to look out the window with the big glasses with lenses and he kept changing them to see if I noticed much difference with monovision. It all happened so fast......I'm not sure which was better.

I am discouraged because I was ready to go and wanted to do this over the holiday vacation, etc. Now everything is totally up in the air. I realize the dilemna rests with my age..45...right there on the cusp. Oh, to be 28 and not have to make this particular judgement call.

I am open to any imput. I live in San Diego. Does anybody have any favorite docs here? Please don't forget my questions. Thanks for reading all of this...it is a good site. When I started browsing, I was so comforted to see everyone asking in their best way many of the same concerns that I have.

I will answer the easy part first. Dr. Mitch Friedlander has an excellent reputation. Dr. Angie Oster is also excellent. Although both of these surgeons perform refractive surgery, they do not 'push' surgery - so you should be able to get a very intelligent and understandable answer as what your best options are.
Now - you said that you can read well without glasses. The problem is that if you have LASIK and correct both eyes to 20/20 for distance, your near vision will be poor. You would need reading glasses. Option 2 is to have monovision. BUT FIRST - you must wear contact lenses and see what you can tolerate. Some people love monovision, and others hate monovision. So before you have someone cut and laser your eye, you should determine what you want to do with both eyes.
Another excellent choice is to wait a few more years. Eventually, you may be able to weat a contact lens in just one eye, and be comfortable with your vision in the other (this uncorrected eye would be your reading eye). Once this occurs, you will need surgery in just the one eye.

I hope this was helpful

Bill Trattler, MD
Miami, FL

You are absolutely right about losing the close-up make-up vision that is valued by our women patients. You are also right in that by having monvision, you should get by with most of your activities without glasses, but for intensive reading and night driving, most people do prefer glasses.
Interesting, though, that you should bring up the idea of being 28 again. If you were, then you would choose distance correction, and deal with reading glasses as a normal event in your life....So why not do that now? Of course, it will take an adjustment, but every other 45 year old is doing it too. Just be sure to buy one of those magnifying make-up mirrors too.
Good Luck, Dean Hu