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Contact lenses.. tips?

neversickanymore

Moderator: DS
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Jan 23, 2013
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Kinda new to these things.. lotsa problems.

So putting them in is a bitch. tips to get them in in three or less tries?


How often do you guys put in drops?


So you get your distance, but give up your reading?


people who have gotten Lasik with a stigmatism?
 
I don't wear contact lenses anymore, but I used to when I was very shortsighted, prior to getting Lasik. I now have better than 20/20 vision and honestly I could not recommend Lasik enough - I don't believe I had significant astigmatism, but really it's irrelevant if you have astigmatism or not, the laser clinic will do a whole battery of their own scans on your eyeballs first and correct whatever needs correcting.

You do hear the odd scare stories and definitely it has been more of a risk in the past, but objectively today the technology really has an extremely high success rate and is improving all the time. I really think the time will come when Lasik or some future iteration of this technique is such a bog standard and quick procedure that it will be performed in minutes in high street opticians rather than prescribing glasses, probably even to children.

One note of caution however - in my experience the clinic can make a difference, there are a couple of big chains that are offering constant promotions and low prices, but if you can afford it, it is 100% worth paying a little more, there are some specialist clinics which don't really advertise and charge higher prices but (in my experience) have higher success rates and just a better outcome overall. I actually was only able to get it done at one of these places in the end because I have another complicating eye condition which meant the big chains didn't want to touch me, but my friend had it done at one of the cheaper places. Fortunately it went well for him also but it sounds like he had quite a different experience in both the procedure and recovery, myself there was basically no pain, hardly even any irritation except in the few hours immediately following the surgery - however my friend had several days of bloodshot inflamed eyes and the procedure itself sounded a lot more uncomfortable. Of course realistically the difference in risk is going to be a few fractions of a percentage point, but you don't want to take a chance with your eyes, IMO.



Anyway, regarding contact lenses :) - what I used to do was take the lense out and balance it on the end of my index finger like a little bowl, then, standing in front of a mirror, I'd use the middle finger of the same hand to pull down my lower eyelid, and use my index finger to place the lense just slightly underneath my cornea. Because the lense will be wet it should adhere to your finger while you're moving it towards your eye, and when you get enough of it onto the surface of your eyeball, you should just be able to take your finger away and it will stick. Once you've done this you can let go of your lower eyelid and look down (so that your cornea goes towards the lense). Contact lenses are designed to sit on the cornea and not move around too much for obvious reasons, so you don't need to place them directly ON to the cornea when you're putting them in - once you've got them onto the surface of your eyeball you can usually get them in the right place just by moving your eye around, and the cornea is the most sensitive part of the eye so if you're not used to putting them in this will be a lot harder.

Of course, there's no getting away from the fact that if you've never worn them before you'll have a blink reflex when putting anything in your eye that is hard to suppress, but keeping your eye open long enough to place the lense in it is just something that will become easier with practice.

Hope this helps!
 
My daughter is not a Lasik user and we change her lenses every six months just to be sure. She gets irritated easily and her eyes turn red. Drops --- Refresh Plus. Works well for her.
 
Funny thing about how prices go down once technology gets more widespread; when I was in college, LASIK cost $5,000
per eye!
 
I had the same problem when I started to wear contacts. My eyes were also irritated and I used drops but they didn't help me much. And then my friend said to me I should have worn them off at the end of each day. So, now I just use drops sometimes when my eyes get irritated. And, of course, I wear them off before going to sleep. I also wear coloured contact lenses when I'm in a great mood. I've been looking for so long to find some good coloured contacts and suddenly I found this site cosplaylens.com. I don't have anything with cosplay but there are some awesome coloured contacts I bought to wear just for myself, not because of cosplay.
 
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Basically, don't bother. The expense and hassle required in order to massage your vanity is not fuckin worth it. Stay with glasses...
 
I used to wear contacts and there would be nights when I didn’t take them out. I was doing an administrative position and I worked 10 hours daily, mostly all on the computer. I started to have issues with reading things and I didn’t know why.

I visited the eye doctor and learned I couldn’t see because I had corneal ulcers in one eye and the start of corneal ulcers in the other eye. I was on steroids for months, antibiotics, too, and I learned my problem was due to wearing contacts while I slept.

I could no longer wear contacts, I had to wear glasses. I also had to get new glasses as my glasses rx changed.

Now I’ve got permanently scarred corneas and I have vision changes that are permanent. I can’t see people’s faces unless they are right within touching distance. I only wear glasses these days.
 
Because I'm a lazy druggie, I got to the stage where I never removed my gas permeable contacts lenses for two years. My optician went apeshit with me because blood vessels were growing into my eyes to compensate for the oxygen deprivation caused by the lenses. My eyes were permanently sore and smoking weed just exacerbated the problem.

I've since tried extended wear soft lenses, but they're still a massive pain in the arse.

I would consider laser eye surgery if I could afford it, but until then I'll stick with glasses thank you very much...
 
Wearing and keeping lenses takes so much of my time. When wearing it, I use this lens solution which is great, and keeping the lenses on my fingertip I trace out the actual side to wear which is confusing if you don’t know the concave or convex part. Make sure the convex part of the lens comes in contact with your eyes. I don’t use drops after applying because that’s too much for me. You follow this, you can do it on the first try.
 
I'm honestly very impressed by how well contacts are made today. When I was first starting out with them, many many years ago, even one night without taking them out would sometimes irritate my eye, and prolonged stretches would usually result in an eye infection so I took them out regularly. The ones they make today, though, I honestly often forget that I'm even wearing them. I almost never get any kind of irritation from them.

As far as discomfort or unease putting them in or taking them out, time and practice will solve all those issues for you in relatively short order ime
 
Update.. I’m much better at putting them in. I leave them in for a week or more with no discomfort. I have never considered colored ones.. I actually have these crazy eyes that change colors from day to day.. mood eyes.

I think I will look into surgery.. that would be really nice.
 
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