"There are two types of pain in this world; pain that hurts you and pain that changes you."

October 18th was supposed to be one of the best freeing days of my life.  

It didn't turn out that way.

Here's what happened.

I was booked for a more complex version of a Blepharoplasty to erase the outwards reminder of the havoc Graves Disease has caused on my eyes.

Instead I ended up living through the most terrifying day of my life to date.

I will state now that this post is very graphic and if you are uncomfortable hearing about medical procedures, I would cease reading now.

I had been stressing over the idea of being awake while doctors cut and removed pieces of my eyelids, but I tried to keep my spirits high regardless.

I took the 1mg of Ativan prescribed to me an hour before the procedure that was supposed to take the edge off the obviously anticipated fear. Looking back I can say with certainty that this pill did nothing to calm anxiety.

I arrived at the hospital on time and after a half hour of waiting

I was admitted into the operating room.

Everything from start to finish felt very rushed and unfriendly. There were no attempts to make me feel comfortable and my glasses were stolen from me the second I entered the room. I became completely blind without my glasses and all the nurses and doctors in the room soon became faceless shadows.

I was told to lay down on the operating table and was draped with paper from head to toe, including layers of thick absorbent tissues being wrapped multiple times around my head. 

The bright lights above were turned on and the doctor, without warning, was soon pressing a large needle above my eye. Without hesitation and not a moment to catch my breath, another was being pressed into the same area only millimeters away; up to four times in each eye. 

I soon found out what the absorbent tissue wrapped around my head was for when I felt blood streaming down my face.

The doctor then pulled down each eyelid and inserted a needle into the hidden fleshy part of my eyes.

At that point my eyes were numb enough not to feel the doctor beginning to sew through my eye lids, leaving the strings hanging long in front of my eyes.

These strings were then used to forcefully pull my eyelids inside out and clamped upwards, leaving them unmovable.

While I didn't feel the sewing I did however feel the flaming hot blood cauterize immediately being grazed repeatedly over my eyelids. I let out a little cry in pain and flinched away. This is the exact moment I felt like the surgery spiraled out of control and I began shaking uncontrollably in fear.

The doctor then held my face and forced two more needles into my inner eyelids unannounced in attempt to numb any sensation further. He asked me to sit up and angrily told me that there was too much fluid in my eyelids now and it was pooling up under my skin, making me in-operable at that point. 
As he exited the room he asked a large male nurse to sit at the end of the operating table and instructed him to massage the fluid into my skin further. He began massaging all around my tender eyelids and put heavy pressure directly on my freshly needled areas, sending shooting pains down my entire body. 

This was when I began to cry uncontrollably.

(Swelling/Healing)

After about five minutes the doctor reappeared and began using the blood cauterizer on my eyelids again. I could feel my heart racing faster and faster and chest pain developing. I mentioned this to the surgical team and as quickly as the surgery started the frustrated doctor called an end to it after feeling my pulse. 

If you have been following my story from the beginning, you know that I developed a permanent heart condition called supra ventricular tachy cardia, which requires medication to slow down a constant rapid heart rate. The anxiety of the surgery and my inability to properly freeze made my heart rate off the charts and the surgery was called off.

I was devastated.

I waited months for this procedure and the girl who developed so much strength during this substantial two year battle with Graves Disease had finally been defeated - five surgeries in.

I cried and begged the doctor to finish regardless of pain because I was so scared of letting people down. My friends, family and co-workers pumped me up for weeks saying I could do this.

Admitting I couldn't was heartbreaking.

(The morning after surgery)

The doctor unclamped my sky high inside out eyelids, cut the strings hanging off my eyes, unwrapped me from the layers of paper piled atop me, bandaged my eyelids and told me to go back to the waiting room and walked out, obviously frustrated at me and the failed operation. 

I sat there crying and said there was no way I was going to sit in a public waiting room with handful of gauze covering my one bleeding eye and no way to contact my family. 

The male nurse took pity on me and walked me to another vacant room away from prying eyes and offered to call my mom for me. She showed up with my sister Lauren mere minutes later and off we went home. I spent the rest of the day in bed, extremely nauseous and unable to see anything in front of me properly due to double vision.

Fast forward two days later. Every night since the operation I had nightmares and I was absolutely unable to even think of the operation without bursting into tears regardless of the time of day. I sit here mere days later with swollen, bruised and burned eyelids from the blood cauterizer. 

One eye is more swollen and now one eyelid sits higher than the other. I'm praying that this is just a healing complication and not permanent from the stretching endured during the operation. Blood has also painfully pooled up in my eye multiple times since surgery.

(The swelling that caused my eyelids to sit at diffrent places)

 I was absolutely adamant that I did not want to write this blog right after the surgery because I didn't want the world to know how heartbroken, upset and ashamed I am that I couldn’t finish it.

However, I have always been a firm believer in educating about the up’s and down’s of this horrible disease and if I didn’t include it, I would be lying to the public and myself. I trust that that everything happens for a reason and how the events played out that day were exactly as they needed to be. 

When I was investigating this operation I couldn't find anything on Google to tell me exactly what was going to happen during the surgery. All that was available was one Wikipedia page and countless ad's for American doctors who are more than willing to perform the operation on people insecure about their appearance.

As always I include pictures on my blog, admittedly unflattering, because I hope to help other people make an informed decision about the surgical choices available to them. I learned that this form of operation wasn’t suitable for myself and my family & I are currently exploring other doctors and methods to complete this transformation.

 (The power of makeup - covering burns from the blood cauterizer)

Knowing I will have to endure this procedure one more time is weighing heavily on my mind but I am thankfully reminded numerous times by loved ones that I need to take things one day at a time. Anything worth having does not usually come easily and knowing there is a possibility that a surgeon can fix my flaws so the teasing and mean comments about my eyes will stop means more to me than dealing with the pain of a few dozen stitches. 

I will take this experience as learning opportunity and gain strength to beat the surgery next time.

I am truly thankful for all the support I have received over these last few weeks from family, friends, co-workers, and complete strangers. I don’t think I could have even stepped foot into that hospital if I didn’t have you cheering me on. While I am disappointed in the outcome, I am humbled and grateful for being reminded about how great my support system is. Your kind words both before & after the surgery were cherished and got me through what I would consider the toughest, most painful situation this disease has ever put me through. 

Thank you endlessly for always being there for me.


I would also like to extend a special thank you to Tamara Plant, the creater of the FIERCE awards, of which I was nominated for recently. I unfortunately missed the ceremony due to this surgery, however I am grateful of the kindness shown to me and the friendship developed between myself, Tamara and the other women who were also nominated. 

Thank you for empowering me to feel FIERCE during some of my darkest days!

(My awesome co-workers sent me this during my recovery!)


"Everything in life occurs as part of a spiritual plan.
Remember that it is through the negative that the positive is appreciated."


-Rayanne