When we first tell people that they need to wear a visual correction – glasses or contact lenses – their first reaction, and their first question, is about when they need to wear their glasses. There are a few myths surrounding this issue, so here are the facts.
Wearing glasses, or not wearing your glasses, won’t alter your sight in the long term. There are some studies to suggest that’s children’s sight can be improved with specialist lens types, but at present there’s no evidence to suggest that your correction will actually make your sight better or worse. If you don’t wear them, in the short term you’ll suffer from eye strain as you try to focus. Squinting to thread a needle or read a book will be at best uncomfortable, at worst will leave you with a nasty headache. So don’t be afraid to wear your glasses! Listen to your Optician’s advice and wear them when you need them, especially if you’re illegal to drive without them!
If you’re under the age of forty, your eyes will do the work for you in focussing close too and far away. You only need one prescription for both. For most prescriptions you’ll be perfectly fine wearing your spex all the time. If you’re short sighted, as you get near to age forty, you’ll be more comfortable taking your specs off for close work. In this case not wearing your glasses will save eye strain. If you’re long sighted you’ll start to find that you need extra magnification for close work at this point.
After age forty-ish, you need help to focus close-up, regardless of what your sight was like before this point. So if you had no prescription before this, you’ll find yourself putting specs on and off when you need to read and then look up. You could have a varifocal with no power at the top of the lens, just your close and middle distance magnification. It’s fine to wear the varifocals all through the working day if it suits your lifestyle not to have to keep taking reading specs on and off.
Trust your optician and your own common sense when it comes to the best times to wear your glasses, and the important thing is don’t suffer in trying to cope without them.
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