Mine used to and I went back to the optometrist a few times about it last year but… turned out I was getting tension headaches and blurry vision working from home not because of screens or my glasses, but because the radon in my home was regularly about 6x the EPA limit. What’s solved my headaches has been moving away, not changing my prescription. OP, consider if something else in your environment is bugging you.
Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
141–150 of 334 posts
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#142I was experiencing discomfort while staring at the computer in my glasses. In the end the solution was quite simple: there was a bend in the frame of my glasses. The second optician straightened the frame manually, so the lenses now line up without much of a curve. After this, my symptoms went away.
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#143I have had very high myopia (-9D) for most of my life. Used contacts for nearly a decade starting 30 years ago. Went back to glasses after that. Would have eye strain issues due to 12+ hours on the computer every day.
When I turned 40 and started have issues with presbyopia, I asked my opthalmologist (who also writes my eyeglass prescription) during my biennial checkup why he has been prescribing powers based on how well I can read the tiniest letters on the board when I spend most of my life reading stuff that is two feet away.
He reluctantly suggested that I could use glasses with 1D shaved off the powers in the prescription. I had already done this before I asked him about it. And it has been a big help as the strain disappeared.
Things get blurry at a distance with the new glasses, but it is not as if I am driving at night on the roads or anything.
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#144I don't have eye strain but have great difficulty getting glasses that work for me. I have a -6 prescription and two out of my last three glasses have had horrible distortion around the edges.
I used to have that problem too, I was -5.25 or so. The problem was I kept getting upsold on high index lenses. Yes, they are thinner, but the distortion at such a high correction was horrible. Small frames help, but then you have no peripheral vision. I switched to CR-39 and it was so much better. It's also the cheapest possible option which is nice. If you ask for the edges to be polished clear the thickness is less noticeable to others.
I eventually got sick of the coke bottles and got Lasik. I can see better than I ever thought possible, but the recovery was brutal. It was more than two years before I could go a day without Systane Ultra.
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#145The solution for me to eliminate headaches when working at computer screens was getting an extra set of intermediate distance glasses specifically for computer work. The "computer screen distance" of 3 ft is in between book-reading distance of 1 feet and driving distance 20'+ feet. I also avoid progressive lenses or high-index lenses for computer work. I commented about how arrived at this solution previously: https:…
This worked for me as well. I just asked the eye doctor for something that would work just past my out stretched finger tips which is where my monitor lives. What kills me is going into the office where I am switching between glasses. Different rooms with different Zoom screens. At home is much nicer where I just have one big monitor to watch. I take my glasses off to read my phone most of the time. Technically my pr…
> I take my glasses off to read my phone most of the time. Technically my primary glasses are progressives but it is nicer to take them off.
Same. I wear progressive lenses and I feel like they do fine as far as being able to read the text on my phone or for reading a book. But I tend to take off my glasses anyway to do these things. I'm not entirely sure why this is since I seem to be able to read the text fine with the glasses. My hypothesis is that I like being closer to the text so that it fills up more of my visual field which helps me mentally focus on the text better.
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#146I used an app iOS “eye movement training” for free post concussion.
The slide rule looking eye training is also kind of rough. A string with two or three beads on it. All fun things that could make me puke from doing too much.
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#147It can be a result of bad fitting, where the optician doesn't measure your pupillary distance correctly, and doesn't line up the focal point properly with your pupil. Similarly, if you wear your glasses in a manner where it doesn't line up correctly (either because you like the way they look at a different spot on your face, incorrect frame adjustments, etc) you can get the same results.
(Not a subject matter expert, but my wife was an optician for 15+ years, so I've picked up a lot via osmosis)
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#148I will say this: if you're not happy with your current prescription, there are ways to get a more intense workup and better outcomes by going to an academic optometry center. In my case, I went to the New England College of Optometry and got prescribed a special type of contact lenses ("scleral" lenses) which have been a major quality of life enhancement. They're expensive, there was a learning curve for getting them…
I just recently got sclerals for dry eyes and I'm still going through the adjustment process. Usually they are prescribed for keratoconus (misshaped cornea) and not something most people need. The doctor actually said it's more challenging putting it on someone without keratoconus (like me) because I am used to having fairly good vision with my glasses and sclerals aren't as easy to get right as glasses/normal contacts. They have been amazing for dry eyes so far though.
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#149Since it hasn't been mentioned yet, I must add this: when we work and focus, especially when using digital screens, we tend to blink a lot less frequently. If tear composition is not good or there are other exacerbating factors (e.g. an AC with high flow), the break-up of the tear film can easily lead to eyestrain and even blurry vision. In such situations, preservative-free artificial tear drops 3-5x a day can lead…
There's an interesting new treatment, Miebo in the US, Evotears in other areas. It's basically a tear film reinforcer (pure PFAS!) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfluorohexyloctane It's really eerie how moist it makes your eyes feel after even a few uses. I have definite reservations about instilling megadoses of PFAS directly into my eyes but there's no doubt that it is amazingly effective.
Thanks for this! Haven't heard of this agent yet, but it really seems promising.
Re: Ask HN: Do your eyes bug you even though your prescription is "correct"?
#150The solution for me to eliminate headaches when working at computer screens was getting an extra set of intermediate distance glasses specifically for computer work. The "computer screen distance" of 3 ft is in between book-reading distance of 1 feet and driving distance 20'+ feet. I also avoid progressive lenses or high-index lenses for computer work. I commented about how arrived at this solution previously: https:…
I'm in a similar boat.
I'm nearsighted and don't need glasses to see my computer screen clearly at all. But nevertheless I started getting headaches from eye strain.
Went to the optometrist, got a pair of glasses just to reduce eye strain at screen distance. Zero difference in sharpness, but I can work all day long with zero eye fatigue.