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What Happens If Your Reading Glasses Are Too Strong?

in News

Statistics show that about 34.5 million people in the United States wear reading glasses, and most of these individuals are over the age of 45. Reading glasses are considered to be the safest way of correcting for presbyopia, a condition that makes it difficult to focus on objects closer to you. This is primarily a result of your lenses becoming stiff sometime over the age of 40, prompting the need for reading glasses.


However, if you’ve received your new pair of non-prescription reading glasses but feel like something’s not right, chances are the reading glasses are too strong for you. Now, the key detail to keep in mind is that it may take your eyes some time to adjust to your new readers. However, you will know something wrong when that doesn’t happen.
 

In this guide, we’ll tell you what happens if your reading glasses are too strong, and how you can find out for yourself.


 

How to Tell If Your Reading Glasses Are Too Strong?

If you’ve got a sneaking suspicion that your reading glasses might be too strong, there are a few things you can look out for to know for sure.


 

Your Vision is Blurred

The first sign you may experience if your reading glasses are too strong for you is blurry vision. If your vision through your brand-new reading glasses is fuzzy or out of focus, especially at close range (where your reading glasses are supposed to make the most difference), you know the strength is off.


A few things to look out for include difficulty in reading smaller text, seeing smaller details on objects, or blurred vision at a distance.

You Experience Frequent Headaches

If your reading glasses are too strong, your eyes end up working much harder to interpret visual information. This is highly likely to lead to frequent headaches, when in fact, your reading glasses should be helping you get rid of such headaches.


If you’ve noticed this increase in headaches since getting your new reading glasses or switching from an older pair, you must consult your optometrist immediately.

Your Eyes Feel Strained

Excessive eye strain manifests itself in various forms, from fatigue, discomfort, soreness, and dryness, among others. If you’re experiencing any of these symptoms since wearing your new non-prescription reading glasses, chances are that they’re too strong for your eyes. Once again, you must consult your optometrist to rectify any potential problems, especially if you’re wearing your reading glasses all day.

You Experience Dizziness and Nausea

While wearing strong reading glasses and dizziness and nausea may not seem connected, they have a very strong correlation. Reading glasses that are too strong end up altering the amount of light entering your eyes, and this change can lead to other short-term problems like feelings of dizziness and nausea.


This happens primarily because the excessive strain caused on your eyes and brain ends up affecting your coordination in some situations.

Difficulties With Depth Perception

Aside from making your vision blurry, reading glasses that are too strong can also affect your visual sense of depth. This may or may not be substantiated by distorted vision closer or at a distance.


This can prove to be dangerous, especially if you end up wearing these reading glasses while driving or playing some kind of sport. As a precaution, you must consult your optometrist to rectify the issue.

What Happens If Your Reading Glasses Are Too Strong?

By now, you’re aware of how wearing reading glasses that are too strong for you can affect your vision and health. From causing blurry vision to leading to recurring headaches, and potentially even some dizziness and nausea, the consequences can lead to a fair bit of discomfort.


One of the major consequences of wearing reading glasses that are too strong is that they can affect your eyes’ ability to focus. Since the human eye naturally adjusts to objects at different distances, strong reading glasses prevent them from doing so, thereby affecting your vision. As a result, you must deal with this at the earliest.


Another consequence of wearing stronger reading glasses is that they can lead to double vision, which can be dangerous when performing activities requiring good eyesight, such as driving or playing sports.
 

Always remember, that stronger reading glasses won’t make your vision better. You must always get your vision tested by a reliable optometrist who prescribes reading glasses based on your specific needs.

What To Do if Your Reading Glasses Are Too Strong?

If you’re already experiencing one or more of the symptoms mentioned above, the first thing you must do is visit your optometrist. If required, don’t hesitate to look for a second opinion to understand what may be causing these symptoms to occur.


Your optometrist may recommend a second eye exam, which can help them determine the exact prescription for your eyes.


The key here is to take action as soon as you suspect something might be wrong and are experiencing one or more of these symptoms.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is It Bad to Wear Strong Reading Glasses?

Wearing readers that are too strong for you can be bad. Doing so can lead to eye strain, frequent headaches, blurry vision, and in some cases, even dizziness and nausea.

Is It Bad For Your Eyes to Wear Reading Glasses That Are Too Strong?

Wearing reading glasses that are too strong can cause your vision to become blurry and even lead to some distortion. However, while they don’t have a lasting impact on your eyes, you must consult your optometrist to eliminate any cause for discomfort.

Are Cheap Reading Glasses OK?

While cheap reading glasses might seem like a - cheap - option to deal with presbyopia, they won’t offer you the quality and protection of a good pair. Features like UV protection, blue light protection, scratch-resistant lenses, comfortable frames, and so on can make a huge difference in your experience with reading glasses.

In Conclusion

At a certain age, reading glasses become a necessary tool to help us see better. Getting your first pair of reading glasses, then, is an experience that’s supposed to make your life easier. However, if your reading glasses end up being too strong for your eyes, you may end up facing symptoms such as headaches, blurry vision, and even dizziness.


In this case, you must visit your optometrist to find out the root cause of these symptoms and check your prescription. This is also where it becomes crucial that you invest in high-quality reading glasses. At 2SeeLife, we have a wide variety of reading glasses to suit everyone’s individual needs. Check out our store, and our blog for more such informative content.