How long can you hold your blink for?

[Justgivemethehobnobs]

I went to the opticians a few weeks ago for a contract lense check and I mentioned my eyes felt dry. The optician put some dye in my eye and agreed that I did indeed have very dry eyes. They start drying over after a couple of seconds, other people can get to 8-10 seconds apparently (very impressive of them)

This just got me wondering if I have to blink more regularly than the more wet eyed people? So using the very scientific one elephant...by three elephants I need to blink but I can hold it, by five seconds it's getting fairly uncomfortable but by nine elephants my eyes are burning and I have to give in to the sweet sweet blink.

Anyone else care to join my experiment, am I really the most dry eyed of them all?

I can't do more than one elephant.

Saw myself on film this week and realised how much I blink.

Looks like I need artificial tears although not a huge priority right now!!!

I just it got to 10 elephants. I think I probably go longer without thinking about it but reading your post made my eyes itchy

Perhaps I am extremely wet-eyed? —I told you I wasn’t crying—

I think we might already have a winner

Has anyone else ever noticed your excessive blinking? My husband has actually complained about my blinking before, apparently it's very noisy!

Now I can’t stop blinking

8 but I'm really tired as I was up so early today

At last a part of my body that works. I’m proud of my herd of elephants, about 10 or 12 (my elephants may have sped up do probably 11).

9 elephants here!

Thanks for taking my mind off the virus for the first time today! I’m going to spend the next 12 weeks trying to get to 15 elephants

Don't mean to brag but 20 elephants

About 8 I’m happy with that!

Ha, my eyes are always itchy! (So it's a great shame that I can no longer itch them)

Oh no, don't cry. Instead let's wonder how often elephants blink. It takes them forever to have their baby elephants so I'm guessing they can go a lot longer than a human?

Oooh! I just made it to 24 elephants! I distracted my brain by reading the comments while counting, seemed to counteract the eye itchiness. 💪

19 elephants here.

@CantKeepSecrets 20?! Do you even have eyelids?!
I can get to rent. Painfully. But am blaming this on tiredness husbands snoring last night and the prospect of self isolation for two weeks

Rent? Ten. Bloody edit button MN we need one!!

Ha yes, I'll start a new thread in 12 weeks to see how much we have all improved!

20 elephants?? That is super impressive!
Think my eyes would actually fall out if I tried to achieve that.

Well I never. I just managed 49 seconds. There's a clock on my living room wall opposite where I'm sitting and I timed it.

Eyes don't half feel weird now though.

I counted to 30 and got bored. BUT I also cry in the slightest breeze or cold weather. I suspect my eyes are too wet

Oh my god. This is actually my new favourite game. I have discovered that if I let myself go into a zen daydreaming sort of daze then I almost don’t feel the urge to blink at all!

I just made it to 34 elephants but then my eyes started watering loads.

I thought you meant how long can I hold the blink for, like with my eyes shut. I was thinking well pre kids ten hours but now probably a couple of hours at best

2 elephants but I have dry eyes that shed tears and water all the time so I blink a lot

@sittingonacornflake that’s what I thought at first but I thought it meant like how long can you hold your eyes closed without actually falling asleep.

I have just done a quick google about blinking. Apparently apart from animals like flies, mole, snakes, lizards etc who either don’t have eyes or don’t have eyelids all animals blink EXCEPT water dwelling animals since the er water keeps their eyeballs er... wet, AND a small collection of animals, including hamsters who wink one eye at a time...

I was unsuccessful in finding out which animal blinks the least however.

Hmm the Zen day dreaming has only given me an extra two elephants.

@Justgivemethehobnobs to be fair that’s a more than 20% increase in elephants, not to be sniffed at.

It also helps if you let yourself relax your eyelids slightly rather than holding them WIDE open which seems (to me) to be the first instinct when you’re trying not to blink.

@soupforbrains thank you for research

well hamsters are a bit weird aren't they?

@soupforbrains ohmygod you're a genius. If I squint my eyes I can get to 22 elephants, doesn't make me look very attractive though.