sunglasses for those wearing glasses- what do others do?

[nowwearefour]

i am thinking ahead to the summer= the first time dd1 will be with her glasses in the sun (we hope!). should i pay £76 for a pair of prescription glasses tinted (and UV protected) to become sunglasses or pay to get her spare pair turned into those 'change in the light' glasses so when she is at school she can come/ go with lenses that are the appropriate level of darkness? what have others done?

for children?

will watch with interest as DD(12) has asked me the same thing

thanks madre. i know there are lots of people on here wtih dc's with glasses so am sure we will get some views at some point!

baseball cap.

we have hundreds. pink ones, blue ones, yellow ones, flowery ones.

those reactolite types aren't recommended for kids (can't remember why) and dd2 (6) would just break prescription sunglasses (we go through quite a lot and always have 3 pairs of normal ones in the house lol)

at 12, i'd be tempted to buy prescription sunnies though - cool ones so they'd get worn. a hassle to change for school though?

My dd is 9 and has been in glasses since she was 2.

I have never once thought she needed sunglasses.

yes clearly a hat for school. good point. am interested the reacto ones not recommended for children. specsavers should ahve prob mentioned that!

but all the advice is that they should wear sunglasses now in the sun? my dd2 has some and dd1 will be rather jealous with her regular glasses. mmmmm. now am confused! they are so expensive but i do want to do the right thing....

dd2 has worn glasses since 2ish as well lol.

we do occasionally let her whip off her specs and put some regular sunnies off if we are sitting in the sun for some time (eg outside cafe or whatever) but tbh the peakm of the cap shields her eyes so they have protection. she's the first one to whinge if she has sun in her eyes though lol. (cue 'where's your hat?)

i'm definitely not forking out for px sunnies yet. secondary school is early enough lol.

(the other thing to ponder is that for new prescriptions they do sometimes mess about with them a bit, so you might be updating the prescription glasses every time they tweak the normal px)

lol, so it would be a new pair every year at least

reactolite are a particular brand which are made of glass so not suitable for children. Transitions are plastic and off the top of my head I can't think why they wouldn't be recommended but will ask the DO's in work tomorrow, who tend to be more knowledgeable on lenses than us optoms!

my dd (6) has had prescription sunglasses and they were only £39 so try shopping around and see if you can get them cheaper. The tinted lenses were put into a standard glasses frame which was the same as her existing glasses. We only got them for going abroad though where it is a lot sunnier than here.

where did you get them from seona?

My dd also has prescription sunglasses. The last thing I want is for her to squint into the sun, as the prescription is for squint correction.

i wear a big hat
there's no advantage to sunglasses over a hat that i can see, and a hat shades your face as well as your eyes

they were from a local independant optician so not one of the big well known ones.

My dd has prescription sunglasses. She mainly wore them for skiing because she refused to wear the goggles over her ordinary glasses. I asked the optician about the reactolite type ones, he said they were unsuitable for children. I don't know why, possibly so I'd buy two different pairs. Her script changed after that, and as we were going to be in England, we went to specsavers and got two pairs of glasses and replacement lenses for her sunnyjobs all for less than a hundred pounds.

I would use a hat at that young age. I didn't get sunglasses til I was 18. Been wearing them since 4. Hats always worked for me.

Plastic photochromics (transitions is brand name) are fine for kids - also give UV protection (UV causes cataract and macular degeneration in later life)and most UV damage occurs in the early years.

Photochromics / sunglasses didn't used to be recommended for children as it was thought it would make them more light sensitive (and I suffered in the sun for years as a child with no sunglasses!). Even my 10month old has "babybanz".

You could also get a fixed tint on "normal" specs - probably the least expensive option

babybanz v cool lol, our first opt when dd2 was teeny tiny offered to put regular (untinted) px lenses in banz as a cooler option than nhs pink with that luscious pink elastoplast neoprene strap... it was tempting (with the matching sunhat lol ) but we just went with curl sides and silicone nose bridge in the end, which worked for a good few years.

are the new transitions lenses v quick to adapt to normal classroom lighting? i thought i remembered criticism of them in that regard? never really looked into it tbh as hats work here...