Eyesight in my 40s - double vision as eyes adjust?

[Codlingmoths]

I’ve had a couple of weeks of unable to focus well driving and working on computers. Endless tests and no physical cause - the current theory is that my near vision is deteriorating with age and I need to adjust my prescription down (I’ve been short sighted for over 30 years), and it will take 2-4 weeks to see if that works, and this is just what happens in your 40s. Only they don’t sound confident of that at all, it’s mainly they can’t find anything else! Has anyone experienced this???

Hi OP , I’m 50 and my near sight began deteriorating about 4/5 years ago . Not had any issue with sight for driving etc though . My choice was to keep my prescription as is for driving with contact lenses and use reading glasses .

Hope you get to the bottom of the problem soon or another poster can help more

I have a very small amount of double vision when reading sometimes - my optician says that I'll need reading glasses at my next visit, but that he didn't want to rush into it / do it too quickly, as there's no going back. I wish I'd just got them TBH, it's relatively minor, but annoying - I sometimes find myself holding my phone further away.

I've already got a mild prescription for distance.

Maybe this is different to what's happening for you actually OP 🧐.

I think so @GeneCity , that sounds pretty normal. I can read books and my phone fine, although more tiring than a few weeks ago. But I read a few paragraphs on the computer screen and my vision slides to pieces. I could force it back but that was very hard on my eye muscles, I’m trying not to strain them now. Gah!

One bump since I didn’t post on the main active topics. I’m not in the uk so going to bed now.

I had some double vision which was fixed with a prism prescription. Did you do the test with red and green squares?

@Dontdeclutterthemagic that test doesn't check muscle balance, it's checking where you're focussing - it's called a duochrome. There are few different ways of doing it.

OP- yes, sometimes people do get a little double vision when they're starting to go presbyopic - but it could be other things too. Are you mainly wearing glasses or contact lenses?

@underneaththeash I wear both, but mainly daily lenses. I’m not sure re red and green squares, the standard tests include the one with the red side background and the green side background. I’ve sat in front of about 6 different machines yesterday for scans and photos, plus eye tests including a fields test. I guess I have to call and order a set of 2.25 lenses today and hope they don’t take too long. I tried to buy reading glasses yesterday but couldn’t find them at 0.5, I now know they bottom out at +1 at all the pharmacists.

Have you had your blood pressure checked? DH suffers from frequent bouts of pericarditis and that causes his blood pressure to drop very low. We've noticed this really affects his eyesight and he has previously been given glasses he can no longer see through as a sight test indicated he needed them, but once his blood pressure went back to normal, so did his eyes!

May not be an issue for you, but an easy one to eliminate.

Interesting- my blood pressure is usually great (unless you are the lady assessing me at the gym who says hmm 124/80? I’d like to see it 120…) and feels the same as usual. Can’t hurt to check that.

I do have a referral for an MRI as the only thing they haven’t looked at so I hope it’s the changing prescription thing!

Probably around the age of 40 I had a lot of tests for double vision, but it wasn't a sudden onset of symptoms. No scans, just hours of looking at patterns and that sort of thing. They pronounced it a benign mystery 🤷🏻‍♀️

Good luck with your MRI.

So it's actually double - you can see two distinct images? Are they side by side or above each other? Does it get worse during the day? Is it better or wose with your glasses or contact lenses.

Your prescription is about -2.50 at the moment? When you're on the computer and not wearing either glasses or contact lenses, is the double vision gone? That will tell you definitely if it's due presbyopic changes.

It is quite complicated - it does sound like they're checking everything.

No, not two distinct images. Double vision sounds more accurate than blurred- it’s not I see blurred, it’s that I can’t get my eyes in sync. It’s the computer but also driving which is awkward.
I’ve put all my text size up, am looking away often, not looking at things too hard, sort of glancing a lot and doing better, except for my work focus which is suffering!!

Good that it's not actually double, but it's unlikely to be presbyopia if it's blurry /fuzzy at both distance and near.
It sounds as if:

1. Something has caused you to lose the intrinsic fusion between the two eyes, which can happen if you have a bad viral infection, or have always had poor muscle balance between the eyes, or could be something a little more serious (hence the MRI)
2. Or there is something that's causing the ocular media to be more cloudy. If it's your cornea, you can check for corneal oedema by looking on the slit lamp a certain way, but also by checking corneal thickness. If you had this you'd notice that you were getting halos around lights . Lens cloudiness could also cause it, you could get lens clouding if you were diabetic or had a cataract.

As I said, it sounds as if they're being thorough.

I have double vision. Over time it got gradually worse and worse and in the end I had surgery to correct it. I saw two distinct images the fake image was slightly higher than the other and to the right. I lost the ability to correct it. Surgery has been a game changer for me.

I really hate to say and probably it’s not but I had double vision but was fine reading anything to length of arm …
turns out it was MS lasted about ten weeks xx