Sailaway wrote:

Rosalie B asked why would anyone want to exercise their eyes to get
better vision when there was Lasik.

I DID NOT SAY THAT. I just mentioned that Lasik was another
possibility. I didn't recommend it - just mentioned it. I do know a
sailor who has had it done (not me) and she likes it very well. I
did not express any opinion whatever on eye exercises.

To answer that completely would take a few pages, but I'll give you a
few reasons.

1) Not everyone is a candidate for Lasik.
2) Not everyone is wealthy and can afford to waste thousands on
something they can accomplish on their own with a little effort.
3) Not everyone gets good results from Lasik.
4) There are several beneficial side effects to using eye exercise that
you will never get from Lasik, including reduced risk of several eye
maladies and diseases normally associated with 'aging'.
5) Lasik can result in worse vision in some people - it is always a crap
shoot since there is no way to tell beforehand who will have a severe
problem. The risk is lower than with earlier procedures, but it still
happens, and is no less severe when it does. A friend of my GF had Lasik
and is now nearly blind in one eye from over-compensation.

I know several people who have had Lasik and went from near sightedness
to having that corrected, but now have developed farsightedness from the
procedure, which is apparently common. A licensed Captain I worked with
this year had that happen to him. So he went from needing glasses for
far vision, to needing glasses for seeing whats in the boat.

And maybe its just me, but I just don't get this whole thing about
rushing out to have some guy cut parts off your body. Frankly even the
thought of that is scary. I would much rather exert a little effort to
correct something wrong with me, than have some MD (esp. after enough
years of hearing from them how little they understand how the human body
works- even the AMA admits that only 15% of what MD's do is based in
science, not to mention the frequent mistakes they seem to make) start
carving parts off me. But, to each his own.