Do you wear contact lenses – are you truly revolting or a strictly hygiene only? Share with Specsavers – you could win £250 NOW CLOSED

[AnnMumsnet]

The team at Specsavers would love to all about your habits (good or bad) with your contact lenses.

We all know hygiene and eyes is very important – so do you tend to toe the line and follow instructions to the letter? Or are you a bit {ahem} lax in that department? How about when you were younger – or had different lenses? How do you dispose of disposable lenses? Does your DP wear them and leave them lying around when they should be in the bin?

Specsavers say "Here at Specsavers we like to make is easy for contact lens wearers - wearing contact lenses gives you freedom and convenience. And at Specsavers, when you buy contact lenses you get more than just the lenses. Our all-inclusive package not only gives you some fantastic benefits but is also an easy way to pay for your lenses. We'll give you a pair of glasses from our £45 range or designer frames from just £35, full aftercare, future sight tests as recommended by your optician and we'll deliver your lenses and solutions, at no extra cost."

Share your habits – good and bad - and everyone who does will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £250 voucher from here

Please note Specsavers may use your comments - anon of course - on their pages on MN, on their social media or possibly elsewhere - please only post if you're happy with this.

Thanks and good luck
MNHQ

I don't require a strong enough prescription to wear lenses on a day to day basis but I have worn Daily disposables on special occasions such as my wedding day, when I wanted my distance vision to be sharper, and I am fastidious about washing my hands before handling x

I use gas permeable lenses which really suit me. I do clean them properly each night but do not use protein remover tabletS as often as I should I do use single use eye drops to clean them when I'm out but don't always wqash my hands in this situation because it's not possible.

wyrdbyrd I'm with you completely on the cost of glasses. Is very hard to justify£400+ on a pair of glasses that are worn infrequently, but play any less and the lenses are so thick there's no way I'd wear them ever.
Since readings this thread I'm proud to say I've been more scrupulous about hygiene and my contact lenses. Thank you Specsavers!

I'm terrible.
Wear the thinnest breathable dailies on the market, and sleep in them, change them once a week maybe.

I love my contacts and hate glasses but I need to get a grip.

I've worn contacts since I was a teenager, I hated wearing glasses but was told to wait til I was the magical age of 16!

I now only wear my glasses at home, take out my contacts (monthlies) soon as I get in as told to do by my optician at Specsavers so as to let my eyes breathe. I had some bad habits when I was younger though, would sleep in them and wouldn't always wash my hands before putting them in.
I'm still a bit lax now though, I don't always throw them away after a month

I've been wearing contacts since age 16. I used to wear them most of the time as I didn't find that I saw as well out of my glasses and I used to live in a very humid climate, so glasses constantly falling down my nose were a huge bother.
I was most miserable when I went on holiday once to beautiful Bermuda and tore a contact lens on the first night. I had to wear my idiot glasses for the rest of the trip. I missed snorkeling, had an impaired kayak lesson, and generally felt fuzzy-blind for a week. I have never since travelled with fewer than two replacement pairs of lenses. In separate bags.

I've never been great with hygiene. I wear monthly disposables and they last as long as two months. I scrub them properly about 30% of the time before I store them for the night. I've tried daily disposables in the past, but they feel like pellets on my eyeballs.

Contacts have fallen out and I've stuck them right back in. I've used tap water and even saliva when I had no other choice. A few years ago, I was told that I had scratched corneas and had to endure a two-week regime of glasses wearing and eye dropping. I hated it and secretly thought it was a total scam. But it has made me a six-day-a-week lens wearer, giving my eyes a breather on Sundays now. After church of course.

What's this about protein tablets for gas permeables? Never heard of this! I've only ever used the small bottle of solution to clean them & large bottle to store them in the case overnight.

Kateemo you lick soft contacts?
Why would it be a scam you having scratched corneas? Who would be scamming you and making money?
You can get silicone hydrogel dailies now. That might be better for you and more comfortable. It's likely the hygiene that damaged your eyes not wearing them 7 days a week.

no i wear glasses

Presumably all the people commenting on here to say that they don't wear contact lenses are doing so so that they can be in to win the prize?

That's a bit shoddy is it not? The whole point of the prize draw is for those who have shared their experiences with contact lenses to be rewarded or their time and input.

There are loads of surveys/prize draws etc that are in relation to stuff that doesn't apply to me. It doesn't make me think it's unfair or anything, some things apply, some things don't.

I didn't even see the prize bit lol!
Yeah why bother though if you don't want to wear lenses. They would be wasted.
I've never been to specsavers as I've stayed with the local optician my mum sent me too as a child! I might switch though as they are so much cheaper! but don't tell my mum

Ahhh, guilty as charged! I really need to stop my bad habits (especially with overwearing), and I'm slowly getting there.

I wear lenses quite a lot but with sitting at a computer in a very warm office all day sometimes my eyes get very dry. I take them out before I go to sleep but sometimes I don't always clean them before putting them away

Stupidity caused by lack of sleep has caused me to do a number of things with my contact lenses.

Once I went to bed without removing my lenses and didn't realise until I went to put them in the next morning. I even accused DH of putting mine in by mistake as the case was empty.

I have tried to remove a lens that I had already removed. It took me a while to work out why it hurt so much.

Generally I'm very, very careful with hand hygiene for my 2 year old's gas permeable lenses (he had cataracts removed at 8 months). I wash my hands with soap in hot water and dry on kitchen paper. I'm not quite so meticulous with my lenses though.

My son has had problems getting the blasted things in. Can't recommend and wish he would wear glasses!!

Timeforabrewnow. He just needs to practice. Every day spend 10 mins trying to put them in but stop when he gets frustrated or his eyes get sore. He will get the hang of it.
What's the problems he's having and we can troubleshoot. The opticians were useless at showing me!

i follow instructions to the letter

Recently switched from daily disposable to monthly contacts. I do keep them in longer than I should sometimes, did with the dailies as well. I'm good about cleaning them at night but miss just being able to chuck them out and have a morbid fear one day I will just throw them out by mistake.

The one thing that bothers me is I am getting blurry vision and double vision occasionally so have to take them out early, but if I'm out and about I can't do this so have to put it with awful vision. I try to carry a spare case filled with solution so I can give them a quick dip to clean them and put them back in or store them. I need to look for travel size rinse so I don't always have to top up from my big bottle. Also, with swapping bags I don't always remember.

I wear dailies, so don't need to worry about storing them. I know I'd be a complete nightmare though!

I don't always wash my hands first, i leave them in from 7am till bedtime and I used to just leave them on the side after taking them out, until DH put a stop to it!

Once one folded over in my eye whilst i was stuck in traffic outside Bristol. As the engine was off i was able to safely retrieve it. I need them to drive, and my glasses were in the bottom of a case in the boot. So i had to use some spit to rehydrate it before i could unfold and return to my eye! I took them both out when i reached my destination!

When I wore contacts I was pedantically hygienic. Several of my more laid-back friends had some ghastly infections - one had such a bad ulcer on her cornea that there were concerns for her vision - all through being slack in their hygiene and irregular about changing their lenses. Terrified me!

I took a break from contacts after I changed to a cleaning system using peroxide. Unfortunately the saline and sterilising bottles were sufficiently similar that I struggled to tell the difference without my glasses. I'm sure you can guess what I did...yup, I put peroxide in my eyes. Why didn't they make the bottles different colours, instead of a tidly matching set?

I want to go back to contacts, but my eyes have become drier with age, and I now find them really difficult. Have not managed to complete any trials.

I wear dailies so thankfully I don't have to worry about cleaning them AFTER. However, I don't always make sure that my hands are clean before so I guess this is something I should start doing. I haven't had an infection yet, but I don't want to take any risks.

I have monthly lenses on Lensmail from Specsavers.

I used to be lazy, but had awful problems so now change solution daily, soak and use for one month only.

You only get two eyes so it's not worth the risk of permanent damage!

When I first started to wear contact lenses as a teenager, I TRIED to be really good and hygienic with them...it wasn't my fault they slipped out my hand when I was putting them in their little case that goes into the sterilising solution and ended up in the toilet! Then I panicked and rinsed them under the tap and then remembered you are not supposed to use regular water on them but only special solution. Thankfully my opticians were very good about it and helped me get them hygienically sorted and sterlised and I was able to use them again.

Now I have disposables and find them much easier! I do make sure I always wash my hands really thoroughly and we make sure we keep the loo lid closed these days.