Sh... ampoo happens

So now that I know that Thomas doesn't have anything terrible going on, I feel able to blog properly about what happened...

Last Sunday he got shampoo in his eye. It stung a bit. Made his vision blurry. You know...

Well, come Tuesday, his vision was still blurry, so I suggested getting an eye bath so he could wash his eye out a bit and help with the 'getting his sight back to normal' process. As the chemist was right by the optician, he suggested we ask them to check his eye just in case. (I know, I should have thought of that. I'm a terrible mother, what can I say?)

So the optician fits us in, asks Thomas to read the chart with his bad eye, and he can't see it. At all. Now, when he said his vision was blurry, I thought he meant a bit blurry. If it was me, and I couldn't see out of one of my eyes, I'd be sure to make that clear...! Still, the optician had a good look, couldn't see any damage, didn't sound particularly perturbed, but suggested we go to the Opthalmic A&E at St Peter's Hospital (just up the road). Up we go (always fun) and ask for the Opthalmic A&E at least 3 times, but go through the usual A&E procedure, now familiar to us after many knee-twisting, ankle-nearly-breaking, head-banging incidents. Eventually we see the doctor who has a very brief look, wiggles his fingers around a bit, and tells us that actually the optician is the expert and he doesn't have the right equipment, so suggests we go back to her. "But she sent us here" I explain. Well, there's nothing he can do. "She's the specialist, not me. Sorry." (Except he didn't say "Sorry".)

Next stop our GP. I manage to get to see her at 5pm on Wednesday. 5pm being, incidentally, the magic time when all on-call Opthalmologists are on the road between Chertsey and Guildford and therefore off-call. The doctor told me this, sighed a bit, ummed and ahhed a bit, then decided to try calling anyway. He was there. He suggested calling the eye clinic at the hospital in the morning and getting an appointment for that day. That's Thursday (are you keeping up?).

Thursday morning. 9am. I call the hospital and ask for the eye clinic. There is no direct number for the eye clinic that I can find, so I need to listen to all the recordings trying to dissuade me from calling the hospital before I get to speak to a person who can put me through. When I do eventually get through the phone just rings and rings. Sigh. I try again 10 minutes later. Same rigmarole, but I finally get through to an answerphone. One more discouraging recording later I am asked to leave a message and they will call me back (there were actually italics...). I leave a wonderfully concise message, repeating my number to be on the safe side, and then I wait. Now there's the dilemma of how long to wait. Don't want to be pushy - they said they'd call me back - but time's getting on and the clinic will be over. I wait an hour and call back, but just get the ringing phone. I wait another hour and try again. This time I get a person. A helpful person. A Staff Nurse no less. I explain the situation and she goes off and checks with a doctor. She comes back and tells me to come in at 9am the next day. Not today then. No. Tomorrow. OK.

So there we have it, an appointment at the eye clinic at 9am on Friday. We get there early, casually look at all the posters telling us not to be surprised if we're there a long time, and settle down for a wait. Two minutes later we're called in and a nurse checks Thomas's vision. Another 5 minutes and we see an Optometrist, who does another bunch of tests. Another 10 minutes and we see an Opthalmologist who tortures Thomas with dye and drops and litmus paper and cotton buds. Everyone says the same - his eye is completely healthy, apart from the fact he can't see anything out of it. Apparently that's not a problem. It'll get better. Apparently shampoo can do that. Not often, but it happens. It should be better within a week. Should.

So that was my week. I have learned the following:-

• If you're going to get shampoo in your eye, best only get it in one eye otherwise you might actually go blind.
• There is not an Opthalmic A&E at St Peter's Hospital, but that's sort of a secret.
• When Thomas says "blurry", he actually means "can't see a single thing".