I didn’t know if this should go in My Humble Opinion or here, but since I’m inquiring about factual causes I think this is the correct forum. If not, please move.
My vision has always been very good, 20/20, but as I’ve entered my 50s I’ve needed to rely on bifocals to read or look at my phone screen. The glasses I’m wearing are only bifocals with no correction for distance. These have served me well for about 3 years now, but not so much lately.
I’m finding that after a few hours of reading or looking at that phone my eyes are becoming very tired and the type is becoming blurred even with my glasses. And I’m also finding that once this fatigue sets in that even without the glasses my distance vision is becoming blurred as well and it last for hours. After a good nights sleep my vision returns to normal only for the cycle to repeat.
Im thinking that my eyes are growing worse with age and it’s time to get a stronger pair of bifocals. My thinking is my eyes are straining to read and are working so hard that it is affecting my distance vision as well.
I have an appointment with the eye doctor next week, but would like some info on how these things work so I know what he’s talking about. So, will poor reading vision contribute to poor.distance vision? Does my theory hold water or are there other causes for what I’m experiencing?
Virtually no one escapes needing correction to read as they get older. It’s caused by the lenses of your eyes getting stiff and not being able to change shape to focus. For most people it happens in their 40s.
Your hypothesis about eyestrain causing your distance problems sounds about right. Your eye muscles will be struggling to focus and will get tired. However, I’m not an opthamologist, so could be wrong.
@ 50 years of age I’d say you have had an exceptional run of good luck. Nothing you describe sounds like anything to be concerned about, all things considered.
Go to the eye doctor and get a prescription for new glasses and be done with it.
Are you doing eye exercises? For every 20 minutes you spend in front of a computer or cell phone, spend 20 seconds looking at something at least 20 feet away. Preferably something with texture that you can focus on.
It’s helped me considerably, and we’re about the same age. While I don’t wear glasses, I probably need them, but by “working out” my eyes, I’ve so far been able to pass the eye exam at the DMV.
The doctor may want to know if your vision gets blurry after you eat, or what you are doing otherwise before it gets blurry. It would help the doctor with a cause.
Yep, agree. One of the only symptoms I had before being diagnosed with T1 diabetes in my late 30s was increased eye fatigue, which completely went away once I got my blood sugar in check.
Other than that, also agree it just happens as you get older. I used to be able to have contacts that let me do all the things; nowadays my contacts work for computer work but I still need reading glasses to read a book. And yes, they’re progressive lenses. Blech, getting old sucks.
Going to your actual questions, the symptoms you describe are simply normal for your (our) age and no, getting blurry vision close by due to age doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll also lose your long-distance eyesight. There are other eye-related conditions which may involve losing eyesight in general but they are different ones and, in people without co-morbidities such as diabetes, generally show up later (cataracts, glaucoma…). The eye doctor will, if he’s any decent, check for possible early symptoms of these as well as getting your new prescription.
If the problem is dry eyes exacerbated by staring at computers/phones, a lubricant like GENTEAL® Tears may be a good remedy (though perhaps slightly expensive). I don’t know if prescription is needed for the simple eye-drops.
Exactly. I went through the same cycle of OTC readers, and then mild prescription lenses that gradually got a bit stronger until cataracts set in, requiring progressively stronger scrips until surgery fixed the problem. The OP is now approaching the stage in life where every complaint to the doctor is met with “Well, you’re getting older.” :mad:
Antireflective coating on my glasses has done wonders to help with eyestrain, but even so, at 50 I now have progressive bifocals and the prescription gets a tiny bit stronger every year.
There’s a particular exercise you may find helpful. You want a good view of the distance, hundreds of feet away with some clear detail out there. Now find something open and lacy and easy to look through or past, such as a bit of window screen or a sprig of grown asparagus or a squiggly bent piece of wire maybe a very open dried flower, and prop that up between you and the distant view, and get it just as close as you can see it sharply. The exercise is to go back and forth, shifting your attention between the close and the distant. You don’t have to look in a different direction, or at most shift your view slightly. You’re just trying to get your eyes to focus in, out, in, out, as big a difference as you can. You’re tensing and relaxing the muscles that change your focus.