We’ve all heard it. We all believe that wearing glasses would make your eyes more dependant on them. It seems like every year since getting your first pair of glasses, your prescription changes for the worse. As a result, you are continually updating your prescription every year, getting stronger and stronger pair of glasses and wished you never got your glasses in the first place. Today, we will dissect this scenario and hopefully shred some light whether there are any truths around whether your eyes are now more reliant on your glasses.
Think about why you have glasses. In today’s day and age, wearing glasses and sunglasses are becoming more of a fashion piece than for vision correction. For this article, we would like you to think of glasses and its lens prescription as a medical appliance or, medication. It is most likely that your first-ever visit to the optometrist is because you had a vision issue. Perhaps you had symptoms of eye strain when you’re using your computer for long hours. Or, you have noticed that street signs are getting a little blurry at night while driving. If the glasses you’ve purchased helps you see better, and gain your confidence while driving under low light conditions, then it is recommended that you wear them.
It may seem that you’re more dependent on them, but it is not going to make your eyes “weaker.” It’s often hard to go back to the previous state of your blurry vision after having shown you the clarity your glasses give. Your eyes and vision may change over time, but it is implausible that it is due to wearing your glasses.
Your glasses are your visual aids. This means they help you see better, and you were recommended them because you were experiencing some vision issues. This means your vision had already become blurry before you were prescribed glasses. It is unlikely that wearing glasses is a direct cause of making your eyes “weaker.” You may feel that you are more “dependent” on them as it makes your life easier. Think about the modern technologies you have at home that you use daily. Could you go through your day without touching your phone?
Your prescription changes every since you start wearing glasses. This is comment we regularly receive as patients come in complaining their vision has changed. Our eyes change as time goes by, and that is usually correlated with some vision changes.
For example, as we get older, our natural lenses inside our eyes change its shape and density. In your early 30s, these changes could be so minuscule, and it has no impact on your vision until these changes summate over time. By the time your vision starts to bother, it is the collective changes over the years that have motivated you to see an optometrist. When the optometrist gives you a pair of glasses to correct your vision issues, now that you are more aware of your eye health, you are more likely to notice tiny changes over time. These natural age-related changes are not caused or accelerated just because you are now wearing glasses.
The Bottom Line
Our bodies change as we age. Unfortunately, our eyes are not part of this exception. You may be a successful marathon runner when you were in your 20s but probably would struggle to do the same in your 50s. Your eyes will undergo a similar ageing process, and your vision may be affected. Your glasses would not accelerate this ageing process, and you may need to update your prescription routinely to ensure you still see at your best. Whether you had perfect vision when you were younger, everyone would eventually need some visual aids, in the form of prescription glasses or otherwise but there are also the lucky few that may have an exception to this rule!