ok,so here is my story..I am a 29 year old male and as far as I know, I dont have any health problems. I last had a check-up from my doctor, including bloodwork, about 6 weeks ago. But I have a ton of problems with my eyes, I have never been to a real eye doctor for a check-up and I know, of course, that I need to go, but I just have so many problems and I am so afraid of what he might tell me. Here is what is going on:
Floaters..I have had floaters since I am about 8 years old, so were talking over 20 years. The only type of eye doctor I have ever seen is an optomotrist(spelling?) for glasses and I did mention the floaters to him years ago and he just kind of dismissed it as something normal that would go away with age but they haven't. I think I have alot of them. The amount of them really hasn't increased over the years though. But lets just say my eyes are filled with them.
Very badly nearsighted....I wear glasses constantly, never take them off, when I have my glasses on my vision is great it has to be 20/20 or atleast something very close to that. When I take them off, forget about it, I cant see anything at all, its horrible. The only good news I can think of is that my upclose vision for reading still remains perfect even without the glasses.
Foggy vision...This one is very difficult to describe. My vision is not blurry, but I think its more of an issue that I have with glares, like if on a sunny day the sun reflects off of a car or something it looks kind of foggy to me, then at night I have a problem with car headlights shining in my direction when I am driving and I also notice halo's around streetlights at night. This has been going on about four years now.
Mucous...Every morning when I wake up, I have these strings of mucous in my eyes. They are pretty easy to get rid of, I just need to wipe my eyes or rinse them with water and they clear up, but this is also something thats been affecting me for years.
Another thing I would like to add is that I do have an anxiety disorder as well as depression and I have done alot of research online and there seems to be a link between anxiety and floaters, I dont know about the other things though. I know I need to see a doctor, and I will, but I am so afraid of what he is going to tell me. My grandmother has severe vision problems and I am afraid I might have inherited something from her, She is legally blind, she has had eye surgeries in the past, although I dont know exactly what she has, but I do know that she has macular degeneration, she is however almost 80 years old and of course with age comes these vision problems, I know, but I am only 29 and I am so afraid of what might be going on. If I was to go to an eye doctor and he was to tell me I was going to go blind, I dont know what I am going to do. Its terrifying. One of my friends told me that nowadays with all the technology they have that noone really goes blind anymore unless you are much older or if you have some type of accident. Is that true? Does anyone have anything to say that could possibly reassure me in any way?!!
Hi.. I have an anxiety disorder too and i have floaters in my eyes. So please dont worry too much.
The mucus that comes out of your eyes.. what does it look like.. colour, texture ect because everyone has something that comes out of their eyes in the morning.
Im not a doctor or an expert but i do know quite a bit on Anxiety and depression as i have both..But maybe your worrying alot about this because you have anxiety.. i have worried about everthing possible! My advice would be to tell your doctor and he, if he feels the need will refer you to someone..If there is something wrong then the sooner you get it sorted the sooner your mind will be at rest! Emma
Matt: You're not going blind. Since you wear glasses you must have periodic visits to an optometrist. Optometrists are perfectly capable of looking after your eyes. If a serious problem arises, he/she will refer you to an ophthalmologist.
Although the mucus doesn't sound serious, it might require drops to clear up.
Floaters are very common with severely myopic people, so that's normal. The foggy vision is also normal. You might find some old posts here describing the various problems of myopes, but not sure what search criteria to use.
Your friend is right, there are few people who are totally blind.
If you haven't been to your optometrist in over a year, make an appt.
Hi I'm 29 too and quite nearsighted since I was very little. I have floaters too, and get new ones once in awhile. I started getting them when I was little. It's true that nearsighted people are more prone to floaters. Also regarding the halos and glare issue - I have that too, pretty bad in fact. Driving at night is a challenge for me because of the bright lights from cars and signs. I see big halos and beams of light coming from any bright lights, especially at night. I've noticed that all my life, and it gets a little worse if I haven't gotten new glasses in awhile.
I wear my glasses all the time too, everything's a big fuzzy blur w/out them.
I wouldn't worry too much about these things because it sounds pretty normal for most any nearsighted person. If you've had your current glasses for a long time, it might help to get an eye exam and get new glasses because they might cut down on the glare and halos a bit.
Thank you for your reply. I do have a follow up question for you though..Have you ever been examined thoroughly by an opthamologist? and if so, what did they tell you?
What also worries me is that lets just say that like you said all my eye problems are being caused by nearsightedness which I guess is a possibility, I'm only 30 years old which obviously is considered to be a young age. If I have this degree of bad vision now then whats going to happen in 10 or 20 years? If I was 90 years old it would be different but I'm not, I'm a young person and I feel I am too young to have such bad sight. I wonder what if anything can be done to save my sight.
I've been to opthomologists many times in my life. They've always told me that my eyes were very healthy (other than being nearsighted).
Have you been nearsighted all your life? Has your nearsightedness changed much anytime recently?
Thanks everyone for your responses. Well, I finally called today and made an appointment for the opthamologist. My appointment is for Thursday at 4:15pm. I will be back to update you all on what he said.
ok,so as promised I went to the eye doctor and I am back to update.
My original appointment was canceled by the doctor so it was finally rescheudled for 7pm last night.
At this point, I dont know what to think. I don't know if I should be happy and relieved or even more confused then ever.
You might recall from my original post that I had a few different issues going on with my eyes. So last night I took my time and made sure that I told him about everything that was going on. The first problem was that I have alot of floaters in my eyes. Out of everything that was actually the one I was concerned about the least only because I have had them most of my life and have just grown to accept them but all he said in regards to the floaters was that they were very normal, lots of people have them, he even said that he has them himself and he said that there is an experimental surgery out there nowadays to remove them but he said that he would never recommend it to anyone and that over time your brain learns to ignore them. So that was the deal with the floaters.
Next came this sort of foggy vision problem, kind of like a problem with glare and halos around lights at night,that sort of thing. He examined my eyes and said he could find nothing to explain what is causing it. I also mentioned that I thought I might have a problem with dry eyes because my eyes have alot of mucous in them when I wake up in the morning and he said that he was able to see some evidence of allergies in my eyes but that it wasn't what he would call severe and since my eyes didn't appear to be red and I wasn't complaining of itchy or burning he said he didn't want to give me eye drops. I had expressed concern about cataracts because when I was doing some research online looking up my symptoms it sounded alot like cataracts but in his words I have a 0.00% of having cataracts.
He did a Glaucoma test by putting some numbing drops in my eyes, he didnt tell me what the pressure results were by number but he said all was normal there too. I then told him that I was also concerned because I thought I was so myopic and he even laughed and said that he didn't consider my to be all that myopic at all, he had a machine that he put my glasses in to determine the strength and I dont remember the numbers but he said that they werent that strong of a prescription and that he sees much worse then me every single day, plus he had me read the eye chart with my glasses and he said I read it perfectly so the prescription is fine for me.
One thing that I was a bit questionable about was that he did not do the test where they put the drops into your eyes to dilate your pupils, I dont know why and I guess I should have asked when I was there but I didnt think of it. He did look into my eyes and used a machine with a blue light but like I said he did it without drops.
So even though it seems like I should be celebrating all my good news right now I'm not because my eyes are just as bad as before I went, I have no answers, no solutions,etc. According to him my eyes are healthy yet I woke up this morning with my eyes filled with mucous, was practically blinded by the glare from the sun driving to work and cant see my hand in front of my face without my glasses.
I guess you would know afterwards by the blurry vision if you had dilating drops, but I'm just wondering if they were administered at the same time as the drops for the glaucoma test.
Apart from that, all I can say is the news sounds overall good. Have you tried any kind of artificial tears in case it is dry eye?
Thanks for your response. I'm just about positive that he didn't use dilating drops on my eyes because my vision was not affected afterwards at all. Plus after he put the drops in for the Glaucoma test he examined my eyes right away. From what I understand about the dilating drops is that when they put them in they usually have you sit for a few minutes before they look into your eyes because it takes some time for them to take effect.
He did look into my eyes with a blue light, he had me look up,down,etc. and for a brief maybe 10 seconds he said the light was going to be very bright and it was and like I said he told me that everything looked healthy.
If I didnt have any complaints about my eyes I would be ok with it all but I went in there with a list of weird eye problems and I just didnt feel like it was much of an examination. I'm wondering if maybe because it was a late evening appointment he just gave me the rush job.
I would recommend using preservative free artificial tears at least 4 times/daily both eyes. Also, try treating the eye allergies with an OTC allergy drop like Zaditor twice/day. Use a warm compress to the eyes twice a day for 15 minutes. You can fill a sock with rice and microwave it for about 15-30 seconds and then place on your eyes, or you can go buy goggles especially made for this.
Dry eyes/allergy eyes would be a good place to start for blurred vision/light sensitivity. Also, if you wear contacts, take a holiday for at least 2 weeks.
If you have no family h/o glaucoma, I would not rush to a speacialist as your chances of having it would be slim. Also, without being rude, how old are you that you are concerned about cataracts?
Last edited by moderator2; 11-30-2008 at 02:07 PM.
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You're all old enough for your eyes to have stopped growing; when you stop growing, your myopia stops worsening too. I'm fifteen and my myopia is over -10.00. I can't describe how scared I am to lose my sight. I love to draw and paint and read and I know that I'd probably attempt suicide if I lost my sight. Losing my sight...would kill me.
What worries me the most is that I just changed glasses a couple of months ago, and on a recent exam at school, I realized that I all I had left was 20/40 vision. When I got the glasses, I had 20/25 vision with them. I can't believe it could've accelerated so fast, although I've had much more schoolwork this semester.
I'm so, so scared of going blind. Please, help.....
Well, I am 35 and my prescription had stabilized for the last 8 years however, I notice that things do not seem as clear in my left eye now and found out that it had gotten worse by .5. I am not really sure that your myopia ever really stops progressing altogether. After all, that's why so many people get LASIK and then end up in glasses again later (for nearsightedness, not just presbyopia).
Anyone else out there in their 30's and still seeing a little progression in their myopia?
I'm only 30 years old which obviously is considered to be a young age. If I have this degree of bad vision now then whats going to happen in 10 or 20 years? If I was 90 years old it would be different but I'm not, I'm a young person and I feel I am too young to have such bad sight. I wonder what if anything can be done to save my sight.
I have had horrible vision all my life, worn glasses since Grade 1. Probably should have had them before that too. My vision is so bad I cannot see the big E on the chart at all. It's just a black blob. My vision is something like 20/600 without glasses. My vision has been that way all my life, and I'm now in my 50's. I wouldn't worry about it getting worse unless you start having to get a new prescription for your glasses every single year because it's getting worse. What I found, actually, is that once I hit my 40's, my nearsightedness stayed pretty stable, but I started to get farsighted as well. (I had hoped the two would merge and I'd have perfect vision in the end, but I guess it doesn't work that way ..)
My mother has had cataract surgeries on both eyes, cornea transplants, two retinal detachments, etc. and being so severely mypoic, the optometrist always checks my retinas because of that history. Nothing.
If you're worried, go see the optometrist and tell him your worries. Otherwise, you're just feeding your anxiety for no reason.
It was quite interesting to read all your messages. I myself am severely myopic and I have had glasses ever since I started going to kindergarden. I am now having -12.25-dioptre glasses and I find it a little comforting that others with myopia have and have had the same fears that I once had.
There are several things that you must know and that may calm you down:
* Yes, people with myopia see floaters a lot more than others. We don't necessarily have more of them, but we see them better because our eyes are elongated and thus the floaters have a better chance to collect in our field of vision.
* Yes, people with high myopia often are prone to see slight haziness or weird light casts in our vision. It's no eye-disease but with high myopia our eyes are not perfectly round (or even perfectly oval) and light can bounce weirdly.
* Yes, if you have high myopia you often have a lot more visible blood vessels. Until pretty recently contact lenses didn't let the eyes breath so our eye had to grow new vessels to properly distribute oxigene to vital parts. Also, our eye is stretched and it may be stretch marks.
* Yes, for most (even those of us with that are highly myopic) the progression of myopia stops. A good rule of thumb is mid-20ies for women and late-20ies for men. If, however, you are highly myopic, slight changes of +/- 0.25 (or even 0.50) are normal and you won't suddenly have -20-dioptre glasses a couple of years later.
Now to the things that a highly myopic people should know, too.
* We are more prone to retina detachment. If floater visibility suddenly jumps and you see flashes in your vision when rolling your eyes you must contact a doctor or preferably visit an eye clinic as soon as you can.
* We are also a little more prone to glaucoma as the deformation of our eye can have adverse effects on the pressure in your eye. Glaucoma progresses slowly and if you believe that you stopped seeing well in low light conditions you should go for glaucoma screening or at least pressure testing.
Now I might add, I am no doctor! All those things I learned from my numerous eye doctors that I visited throughout the years; it doesn't change the fact that I am uncomfortable with the fact that I am highly myopic, but I at least stopped worrying about it.
HI There I was reading this thread, when I was researching Glaucoma.
I have a question.
How good are a optometrist's Glaucoma tests?
Because I visited mine last month she told me my eyes are healthy, but I am still worried that I might have Glaucoma, but no one else in my family has gotten it, but I am the only person in my family with very poor vision and my dad has poor vision too but not as bad as mine.
