Your eyes are arguably one of the most important sensory organs of your body. You can’t enjoy the scenery of our beautiful earth or the sight of your loved ones if you ever end up losing up your eyes by damaging them to their limits. That’s one of the important reasons why taking deep care of your eyes should be very, very crucial to you. We often develop bad habits that aren’t ideal for our body organs. You might have developed many of these bad habits, which would be causing damage to your eyes, and you didn’t even realize. So, here I’m going to discuss 10 daily habits that can damage your eyes. Learning about these habits will help you understand the problems and their solutions. So, stay with me and read on.
Continuously staring at your smartphone.
The most common of all the bad habits that most people might have developed is to stare at their smartphones. When you stare at your smartphone’s screen for too long without giving your eyes a break, you can develop certain eye problems like dry eyes, nausea, dizziness, and blurred vision.
It’s a good idea to give your eyes a rest after some minutes of using your smartphone. Increasing the text size of your smartphone display is also a considerable thing to do. If you feel continuous pain or discomfort in your eyes after a long smartphone usage session, it might be a good idea to visit your eye care center for a quick eye examination. Your optometrist might suggest eyeglasses to wear while using your smartphone.
Rubbing your eyes
I get it. It’s very tempting to rub your eyes while you’re feeling some irritation in them. But let me inform you, rubbing your eyes is a big no. While you’re rubbing your eyes too hard, you might end up breaking the blood vessels under your eyelids.
If you still can’t stop yourself from rubbing your eyes, wash your hands, and dry them up before doing so. If you realize you have hurt your eyes by rubbing them too hard, visit your eye care center and see your eye doctor as soon as possible.
Not putting on safety goggles
You might look silly when you put on these safety goggles, but it’s certainly a must to wear them before performing some house renovation process like mowing your lawn or nailing a picture of your young one on the wall. Any projectile emerging from such activities can damage your eyes. So make sure to use these safety goggles hanging around in your garage before doing something similar. In case you have already made this mistake and have damaged your eyes, reach out to your eye doctor in his eye care center.
Not putting on sunglasses
You may not know the importance of this one, but let me tell you, it’s indeed very, very important to put on your sunglasses whenever you go outdoors. When you’re outdoors and not wearing your sunglasses, your eyes are directly exposed to harmful UV radiation from the sun. The high-energy visible (HEV) light from the sun can also age your eyes and damage your eyelids. So, make sure to purchase high-quality sunglasses that block all UV radiations and wear them whenever you go out.
Smoking
You might be wondering how smoking is linked to your eyes; let me explain. Smoking is harmful to almost every part of your body, eyes being one of them. Smoking causes diseases like cataracts, dry eyes, macular degeneration, among others. In the worst-case scenario, you can even lose your vision. A study says that smokers are 4 times more likely to lose their vision than non-smokers. It doesn’t matter how old you are; it’s always a super great idea to turn around and quit smoking. You must also pay a visit to your eye care center to see your doctor for an eye examination if you are a smoker or have been a smoker in the past.
Not getting enough sleep
This should be obvious; not sleeping enough at night can cause problems like red eyes, blurry vision, dry eyes, and dark circles. Hence, make sure to give your eyes enough sleep to keep them healthy and safe.
Not taking regular eye examination
There might be certain eye diseases and problems growing in your eyes, and you might not even know about them. What’s the solution then? Go to your eye care center once in a while to see your doctor and take an eye examination. Another reason to take your eye examination schedule seriously is that vision-fatal diseases like glaucoma show no signs until the patient’s eyes get permanently damaged. An eye examination can take out these possibilities by detecting such diseases.
Wearing contact lenses during sleep
A common mistake people with contact lenses do not take them out before going to sleep. Doing this can cause infections to your eyes and can also cause permanent damage. So make sure you remove your contact lenses before going to sleep. Don’t forget to wash your hands and dry them before attempting to remove the contact lenses.
Not wearing your eyeglasses
Have you forgotten to wear the eyewear your optometrist prescribed? Stop doing that! Not wearing the eyeglasses prescribed by your optometrist can cause many minor problems like blurred vision and permanently damage your eyes. Your optometrist would have suggested these eyeglasses for a definite reason, so make sure to wear them all the time.
Not using eye makeup correctly
Every chemically manufactured eye makeup, including mascara, eyeliners, and eye creams, is a major potential threat to your eyes’ safety. If you put your eye makeup very close to your lash line, you might block your oil glands. This, as a result, can cause many types of infections. Make sure you don’t use makeup that’s older than 3 months. Damp and dark environments are breeding grounds for bacteria. There’s a chance your old makeup kits might have tons of bacteria growing in them. It would help if you also used makeup from well-known brands as cheap makeup companies might have used fatal chemicals for your eyes’ health.