Franksnbeans,
Thought I'd share my experiences. Like you I was shortsighted. Applied for RAAF @ 17 after school and was rejected. 6 years later in 1986 I picked up a hitchhiker who raved about refractive correction surgery. You guessed it, I had it done and reapplied to the RAAF with 20/20 vision. I breezed through the selection interviews etc (by this time I had a science degree) and was accepted, Yahoo! All I had to do was pass yet another medical. Well, the gods were not on my side. The opthamologist detected that I had corrective surgery and that was that. I did not actually fail any eye examination which was the basis for my appeals. These were unsuccessful, I got the feeling they weren't taken seriously. I actually considered getting a referral from the Russians since they apparently accept people in this situation! Anyway, two points.
1. The RAAF had no idea I had applied and been rejected 6 years previously.
2. My surgery involved a small scalpel making precision incisions rather than a laser as used nowadays. Maybe the modern technique is undetectable, I don't know.
Hope this helps. By the way, I still have 20/20 vision 14 years later.