I don’t claim to resemble him in every way, but his unfortunate fate came to mind in the last few months as I suffered from recurrent corneal erosion. A short description: imagine that intermittently 10-20% of the skin of your leg is torn off, and grows back within a few days. Now imagine that instead of the leg, it is in fact your cornea, it only happens at night, and it is your own eyelid that is sticking to the cornea and tearing off the top layer. This is certainly the most annoying, painful and debilitating condition I have come across that is essentially trivial in that it won’t really cause any permanent damage. Doing anything with the eye for hours or days after an attack is very difficult, and for me going an hour without reading is very unusual, let alone several days.

Apparently there is a good chance of simple treatment succeeding, and more complicated options exist.