New glasses for Astigmatism, heavily distorted.

[mod...@gmail.com]

Hello all, I got here from googling a similar set of keywords to my subject, and there seems to be some knowledge here so I figured I'd post and ask for some insight/wisdom/advice/whatever you want to offer up(except children, no thanks)

Okay so I recently decided to do something about my astigmatism. I got a script in 2011 and was told it was so mild that unless I absolutely felt the need, I didn't "HAVE" to get glasses.

I can't recall exact numbers, but If I find the script (I know I have it, just not sure where) I will post up.

So it's the end of 2014 now, and I finally got glasses. Went to a new Dr. (Recommended by several personal friends) and after day 1, I already went back and complained about my left eye specifically.

The script reads as follows:

Eye-sphere-cyl-axis
R: PL -150 165
L: PL -150 45

After going back he checked and re-checked my left eye and the glasses and insists my axis is 45 but through some messing around determined that .25 diopter more in my left eye was better (and I agreed, it was significantly sharper at distance) and he noted that my left lens of the glasses was only at 40 degrees (I'm assuming this will be corrected also, but not sure and will be asking)

I will hopefully be getting my glasses back today.

So here's my issue, the left side of near objects is significantly distorted. Holding a rectangle piece of paper in front of me at arms length the bottom of the left side is curved inward significantly and upward slightly almost as if the bottom left corner is being pulled towards the top right corner. And when I look at my phone screen and tilt the phone away from and towards me the right side seems to stay put while the left side shifts up and down (like a trapezoidal effect)

Distance vision seems relatively normal, and much clearer with the glasses than without.

Is it possible that he's "over correcting" and the script is actually too strong? And the other thing I'm questioning is if his equipment is out of calibration and the axis of my left eye is not actually 45. The reason I'm questioning this is because I found an online astigmatism test and my right eye consistently comes out at 165 but my left comes out at around 30. I tried moving further away and the most I could get the left to come out at was 35, but the right was still 165

I should also note that he insists that I need to adjust to the new glasses and that its "normal" for things to look the way they do with a new pair.

Also since I've never had glasses before, he kind of comes of like "I'm the Dr. And you know nothing because you've never had glasses" or at least that's how I perceived it.

Sorry for the long winded post, tried to be as detailed as I can.

Thanks in advance for your help

[mod...@gmail.com]

I should also note that my right eye had some perspective distortion initially but by the end of the night had gone away almost completely while my left eye increased in distortion and the following morning (and even now) my left eye is significantly more sore than my right. And even bloodshot. Is that an indicator of the wrong axis?

It feels like the left side is wrong. I'm trying to avoid wearing a prescription that may be incorrect and potentially hurting my left eye/muscles due to excessive strain.

Thanks again.

[The Real Bev]

Robert Martellaro will probably respond eventually. Maybe Mike Tyner
too, both are expert professionals. I'm just a user.

If it's uncomfortable it's wrong. Period. You get used to strangeness
pretty quickly, but not wrongness. I've worn glasses for 35+ years and
only ONE set was wrong -- the guy recognized it and remade one (maybe
both, it's been a long time) lenses. If you can't get used to it within
2 days, it's wrong, especially with only minor correction.

I have a similar perspective distortion right now, which I assume is due
to a widely different prescription after cataract surgery on my left eye
on Oct 29.

Before surgery:
R +1.50 -3.25 x100 +2.5
L +4.50 -3.75 x077 pd = 60/58

After surgery:
R +1.25 -3.25 x99 (functionally the same as above)
L - .25 - .5 x85

I had a new left lens put in my glasses, leaving the right one the same.
My retina is still swollen, so I have hopes for improvement, but the
astigmatism correction in the new ($1K) lens is perfect as far as I'm
concerned.

With my glasses the right side of my screen is a bit shorter than the
left side, but my brain ignores the difference. If I look without my
glasses or with +1.25 dollar-store reading glasses, the screen is a
rectangle. With correction, it's weirdm but if I look at the screen
with only one eye (either eye) it looks the way it should.

Have you thought about contacts? Eventually I want to try multi-focal
contacts. Previous attempts were inadequate due to slippage of the lens
due to the angle of my astigmatism (vertical football), but with that no
longer a problem they might work a lot better.

--
Cheers, Bev
==========================================
"If Mary Jo could float I would have been president."
-- Ted Kennedy

[mod...@gmail.com]

Thanks for the reply!

So they didn't get my new lens in Friday as the had hoped. So I asked if wearing the glasses would harm anything as I can see details better with them on than I can without. They said no, you'll be fine over the weekend. So I picked up my glasses with the original prescription in them and wore them almost all weekend. By the end of the weekend the right side of objects nearer to me began to straighten out quite a bit to nearly the way I expected. But the top, bottom, and left sides were still quite skewed. Walking with them on is slightly nauseating unless it's a wide open space. Walking through aisles of stores is quite nauseating and things seem warped and distorted. I've noticed some objects appear to be closer to me than they ever have prior to getting glasses.

For example the ceiling fan in my living room looks almost like it's jumping off the ceiling at me, sort of like one of those 3D scene books or a 3D movie had appeared to me pre-glasses.


So it's Monday now, and my new lens came in for the left side. I asked and was explained they had corrected the angle of the lens by 5 degrees and increased the diopter by 0.25 so I'm assuming this means -1.75 now instead of -1.5. And the angle went from 40 to 45 (The original prescription was 45, but the lens somehow was at 40) I dropped them off and picked them back up in about an hour and a half, so my eyes had about an hour and a half to go back to "default" or whatever is normal without corrective lenses in my case... Upon picking them up they had me try them on, and asked me how things looked. Distance vision was now crisper and easier to see and read signs and such, and I noted slightly less "warping" of the left side of things up close to me. Perhaps the Dr. was right all along?

So It's been a few hours now since I've had them back, and again the left side, top, and bottom of things appears significantly warped to me. If I close my right eye everything shifts like a trapezoid and the top edge of things leans down towards the right. If I close my left eye, things slope in the opposite direction but ever so slightly, nowhere near as extreme as the left.

Now here's where the weird comes in... If I keep my right eye closed and rotate my left lens counter clockwise by a fair amount while only looking with my left eye, things closer to me straighten out nicely and even get sharper. However, things in the distance get slightly blurry, but don't seem to change perspective much.

Doing the same thing with my right eye I notice that things seem to look their "best" sharpness and perspective wise at almost the natural resting position of the lens, I can clear up the minor amount of distortion of closer objects by rotating the right lens clockwise JUST a tad, but things get blurry at all distances, So I'm calling the right lens "ok".


I'm not sure what the outcome will be yet if I "give it a week" as I keep getting told by everyone.

Every time I bring this up to anyone else I know that has glasses, even those with astigmatism also they all say "it's normal, you've never had glasses, give it time, you'll get used to it"

The part that bothers me the most is, things do slightly start to "straighten" out as I wear these, but when I take them off things appear warped in the opposite direction that they do when they are on. Does that make sense?

I suppose I will "give it a week" as I've been told and see if things stay the same or get worse or better.

Worst case scenario I can always get a second opinion from another Dr. right?


Thanks.

~Aaron

[judyb...@rogers.com]

The "skewing" and "tilting" of the world is normal when first wearing astigmatism correcting lenses, especially with oblique axis as you have. It is due to magnification effects of spectacle lenses which creates a spatially distorted image on your retina and makes your brain think the world is tilted. After a few days, your brain will figure out that the world is not tilted and the skew will disappear. The quickest way to fix this is to wear the glasses full time.

Judy

[The Real Bev]

On 01/01/2015 09:35 AM, judyb...@rogers.com wrote:
> The "skewing" and "tilting" of the world is normal when first wearing
> astigmatism correcting lenses, especially with oblique axis as you
> have. It is due to magnification effects of spectacle lenses which
> creates a spatially distorted image on your retina and makes your
> brain think the world is tilted. After a few days, your brain will
> figure out that the world is not tilted and the skew will disappear.
> The quickest way to fix this is to wear the glasses full time.

I've worn astigmatism glasses (2.5D) for decades, but this is the first
time I noticed the skewing. Could it possibly be due to my left
(post-cataract-surgery) eye now being slightly nearsighted instead of
+4 farsighted? Neither eye is fully corrected for anything and never
has been :-(

--
Cheers, Bev
-----------------------------------------------------------
"Don't you wish there were a knob on the TV to turn up the
intelligence? There's one marked "brightness", but it
doesn't work." -- Gallagher