enlarged pupil and absolutely terrified. Can anyone help? please!

[kaylasmum]

Hi, i'm really hoping someone can help alleviate my fears, 3 days ago while on holiday i noticed that my left pupil looked larger than my right. Not much bigger but noticeable. Sometimes it looks like its gone back to normal end then i'll look again and its bigger again. I have real problems with anxiety and suffered from PND after my little girl was born 4 years ago. i had a little boy 10 months ago and feel sure that my PND is returning. Anyway i called NHS 24 when i first noticed this and they said that as there was a lack of any other symptoms then i should'nt worry, but needless to say i still worried and the next day i spoke to my GP over the phone who said pretty much the same as the nurse and to go to an optician to get my eyes tested when i got back from holiday. So again i felt a little better until my grown up daughter came to see me and said that she could definately see the difference, just when i thought they were looking more equal! I got myself in to total panic and called my GP surgery again, spoke to a different doctor who tried to calm but unfortunately did'nt really. He told me i should go for an eye test, and i proceeded to break down into tears and told him that i was worried that i had a brain tumour or was about to have a stroke as my mum died of a stroke at the age of 45.

He told me that both these things were unlikely. Because i was in such a state my daughter called NHS 24 for me again. Went over all the same things with the nurse and she reckons the same as the others. I do intend to go for an eye test first thing tomorrow morning. I have been getting lots of tension headaches over the past few days also, my neck is very tight feeling too. Earlier on i felt that i just could'nt function or deal with my kids, i know thats awful but ireally felt that i was going to have a breakdown. I'm so scared, just hoping that someone can give me some reassurance.

Tracey.

Hi Tracey, sorry you are having such a worrying time. I'm not a doctor (and even if I were, you can't diagnose someone from a online conversation...) so can only sympathise and say try not to worry so much. It's hard when you may have PND to keep things in perspective, I know, but try to breathe calmly and wait and see what the eye test reveals.

Btw, tension headaches and tight necks are probably because you are anxious, not necessarily signs of anything seriously wrong. But do have the eye test, just to make sure.

Looking things up online is dangerous because you always get the impression that things are a million times worse than they really are... but Medline Plus (reputable source) suggests unequal pupils are normally just one of those things that happens for an unexplained reason. It seems to be only when it persists that it may, sometimes, be a sign of a real problem. And 'persists' means more than a couple of days, I'm sure.

you haven't got a lazy eye, have you?

Kaylasmum try and calm yourself - deep breaths.

PND is horrible and I am sure that there is a perfectly good explanation of your pupils differences. The optician will advise if anything is wrong, which I am sure there isn't

Could you be going down with a virus? here have been a lot going around recently, with headaches and stiff necks.

Try and get a good (hopefully!) nights sleep and be calm for tomorrow.

my optician spotted one of my pupils was bigger than the other. he did some extra tests to rule out a sinister cause (can't remember what that was). nothing sinister was found. he told me it was fine and can happen after childbirth and if you are very tired.

keep calm. i am sure you will be fine.

tracey, my eyesight is poorer in one eye than the other, and as such my pupil is always slightly larger in that eye as it tries to let more light in to compensate. This is something I've always had though, and is the result of an uncorrected eye problem when I was little.

yes, Dingdong, same here (lazy eye)

It could be sinusitis.

Is the enlarged pupil on the side where the headache is?

Kaylasmum, I'm an optometrist and have seen lots of unequal pupils. Firstly, it is very important to have it checked out, but of all the people I have seen with this in 17 years I could count on the fingers of one hand the patients where it turned out to be a major problem.
Please don't google for this as you will get all the worst case scenarios which probably don't apply to you at all. Just wait and see what your optometrist says tomorrow. And keep us informed!

Hi mum! Just thought i'd leave a wee message too! Just so everyone knows i never meant to worry my mum further i just had'nt seen her eye and when i saw it today it was noticable, although only very slightly. Thsnks to everyone for helping my mum feel better and don't worry mum, everything will be fine! xx

DS has unequal pupils. He's had checkups with an eye specialist a few times over the last couple of years but they found nothing wrong with him and eventually discharged him. Lots of posts here to reassure you, so please don't worry.

thank you all for replying so promptly to my post, you too Leanne!!

Artichokes- i have been really tired recently as my little boy is a very poor sleeper and tends to want to be breastfed all night long, i think i probably average about 6 hours of broken sleep per night. I did wonder if exhaustion could be a cause.

Chipmonkey- you say you've seen a lot of people with unequal pupils over the years, what is the main cause for this. Sometimes they look equal and then its looks enlarged again.

Dinny- no i dont have a lazy eye, at least not to my knowledge.

Pingukiller- the headaches have been more at the back of my head and my neck and i do think they are tension headahces due to the worrying. I did'nt think sinusitis could cause enlarged pupils but then i had'nt heard anything about it until a couple of days ago.

Thanks again to everyone and i'll let you all know how it goes with the eye test.

Tracey

Headaches & stiff necks can be caused by grinding & clenching your teeth.

You sound like you are under a lot of stress, so you could well be doing one or the other.

When you are feeling particually stressed try & notice how your jaws are...are they clamped together? If so, put the tip your between your front teeth to stop you. If you do it enough it should help stop the cycle.

If you are grinding you may need a nightguard to stop.

put the tip of your tongue between your

.

just seen this thread - how did it go with the optom this morning?

i'm not an optometrist, but i am an optometric clinical assistant (i do the tests the optom's too important to do!) and, like Chipmonkey, have seen lots of unequal pupils and have never seen a sinister cause (probably not been in the business as long as CM!)

Hi urbandryad,
thanks for getting back to me, its very reassuring to hear that you've seen lots of unequal pupils without there being a sinister cause. i've not been to get my eyes checked yet, managed to get a long lie for once. my 10 month old is such a poor sleeper and i'm absolutely shattered. someone said earlier in the thread that tiredness can cause uneven pupils so thats maybe the problem. I've posted occassionally on the jan 07 post natal thread, i think your little boy is a week older than mine. i'm breasfeeding josh and he wants to feed all night and i give in to him cause i'm so tired.

aahhhh, yes i remember you, though i recognised your name from somewhere! i'm still bf-ing my ds too, it seems like all night! do you co-sleep, i found it really helped us a lot, as i can sleep through most of his night feeding (except when he nods off and his teeth graze my nipple! yowch!!)

most opticians are open on Sunday - make an appointment for tomorrow and get it checked out, just for your peace of mind!

Mine change too. One is often bigger than the other. I have a lot worse sight in that eye too.

When I went to the Opticians about it, he also said my pupils are slow to react to light and dark.

Obviously I had a million questions for him then!

But he said not to worry I was probably born like that.

Go and get it checked anyway...you'll feel better.

I do neuro observations in patients all the time and it is not unusual for pupils to be of different sizes and for them to vary - so long as they are both reacting to light then all is fine.
You sound like your anxiety and depression is taking hold and your reaction to your pupils has been a little obsessive - please go back to your gp and ask for them to help as once you have control of this i'm sure you'll feel a lot better about everything else.
Ask your gp if you could take aspirin as a precaution against strokes - i'm sure if he thinks you are genetically predisposed to this then he would be happy to prescribe.
However it is more likely that your mother was just extremely unlucky and you are no more at risk than anyone else.

Hi, just to let you know that i went to the opticians yesterday, was so difficult to find one to take me but my daughter went in to specsaver and literally begged them to see me, so they managed to squeeze me in. I was a complete wreck, thought i was going to have a panic attack and started babbling about having a brain tumour! Anyway the optometrist was really good, she had a look at the back of my eyes and said that the nerve leading to the brain looked really good and that my pupil was reacting very well to light and that there was no evidence of a tumour. I had another 2 test and they came up perfectly normal. She did say that she would refer me to the hospital as i was so worried but i told her not to as i think that waiting for an appointment will only highten my anxieties, i need to get that sorted out first. So i'm going to my doctors tommorrow to try to get things sorted out. I'm on medication for PND already and am really worried that they will want to increase the dose. I'm breastfeeding my little boy and i just dont feel good about taking a higher dose. I feel a bit calmer now and i'm not looking in the mirror about 50 times an hour but still feel quite tense and stressed. thanks agian for everyones replies it made a big difference to me and helped to calm me down.

Urbandryad- I kind of co-sleep with Josh, he starts off in his own bed but when he wakes up i bring him in beside me and never get round to putting him back in his own bed. He just feeds on and off all night which i find really uncomfortable. As soon as i move or turn over he wakes up and wants to feed again. I am just so tired and i think my physical and mental health are breaking down because of it. Is your little boy crawling yet? We try to encourage Josh to crawl but he hates lying on his stomach.

.

kaylas - that is good news re the eye test. specsavers optoms are generally very, very good (i used to work for them!! ) would it be worth asking your gp for details of a support group? i know it's nigh on blardy impossible to get any sort of cognitive counselling on the nhs!

Z is crawling and walking round the furniture, but still barely eating any solids!! come back to the PN thread, we're lovely really!!

Kayla, great news! Sorry, have not been on MN for the last couple of days so didn't answer your last question. Most of the time, people referred with unequal pupils are given the helpful info that it's just "one of those things" Unless there is an anomaly in the way the pupil reacts to light, it's usually not worth putting people through rigorous testing for what generally turns out to be nothing. Where there was a problem it was usually an inflammation of the optic nerve but your eye test has ruled that out.

Thanks chipmonkey for getting back to me. I went to my GP ysterday as i was still a bit concerned and wanted to see if she thought that i should be referred to the hospital or not but i told her that i think that it would just make me more anxious and she agreed with me. She had a look in my eyes and said that she could'nt see a difference, but i definately can but only from time to time. I find that in normal daylight they look pretty much even but in artificial light they seem different. Why do you think that would be? I don't really know if this is something that i've always had but i think i would have noticed it by now, i'm 41. I want to be able to put this to the back of my mind and not look in the mirror so much, i've got loads of photos of my eyes on my mobile phone, god forbid i should lose it and someone finds it, they'll think i'm
crazy!

Should my mind be at rest given the results of my sight test? Sorry for being such a pain. Im having to stop myself going back to the doctors. I'm sure on my notes there is written "OVER ANXIOUS PATIENT".

URBANDRYAD--thats great that your little boy is walking round the furniture, i think Josh is going to be really slow. My other son did'nt walk until he was about 18 months, mind you he's still pretty lazy and he's 21 now. Some things never change.