Im saying that this is the same eye injury, but I suspect it's probably very close. When I saw younger, one of my friends thought it would be funny to rip a piece of bark off a tree, stick it behind my head, then ask me to turn around with the piece of bark ready to hit me in the face. What ended up happening was that another friend tripped into me at the same time I was turning and my head went down with force, the bark going right into my eye. I had a very similar reaction. Shock pain, which was just heavy stinging. And my eye lid wouldn't allow itself to be opened.
Any time I go to an eye doctor now, they'll always bring up the fact that I have a big scar, actually on my eye ball. From what I understand, the bark hit me on the eye lid (also have a scar on my eye lid).
The recovery wasn't grueling. But I was supposed to wear an eye patch for a week and take eye drops every so often for 2 weeks.
I took the eye patch off after 4 days. I was able to see, but I had a blue tint to my vision for a while.
Wouldn't be surprised if he's unable to go Saturday but came back Tuesday.