When the sky is clear and the sun is shining, you would be hard-pressed to find someone who wouldn’t want to spend the day outdoors. After throwing on a pair of shorts and lathering ourselves in sunscreen, we are ready to become one with nature, right? Wrong.
But wait, you are forgetting one valuable, vital organ – your eyes. Like other parts of the body, your eyes require special care to protect them.
Protecting Your Eyes From The Sun
Like our skin, our eyes are susceptible to damage from the sun. This is because of UV light. When light from the sun approaches Earth, our atmosphere filters out the majority of harmful UV rays it brings with it.
Unfortunately, over the years the atmosphere has begun doing a decreasingly worse job. Because of this, we must take matters into our own hands and protect our eyes ourselves.
Protecting our eyes from the sun is as simple as wearing UV rated sunglasses. The special tinted lenses in sunglasses block UV rays from coming into contact with our eyes.
Besides, who wants to spend the day squinting? That’s how you get wrinkles.
Tanning
Tanning is especially dangerous for our eyes as we are purposely prolonging our exposure to the sun’s harmful UV rays with little-to-no sunscreen.
To ensure your eyes are well protected when tanning, wear tanning goggles. Although they may look goofy, tanning goggles protect from serious problems, such as: cataracts, macular degeneration, or conjunctivitis. They also won’t leave you with the horrid raccoon mask look.
Swimming With Contacts
Some of us prefer to wear contacts rather than eyeglasses for a number of different reasons; they’re comfier, they don’t require you to wear frames, or perhaps you find they give you a wider field of vision. Whatever the reason may be, certain responsibilities come with wearing contacts.
One of these responsibilities is to ensure contacts are removed before jumping in the pool. Swimming with contact lenses can result in eye infections, irritation, and potentially sight-threatening conditions due to bacterial contamination.
The FDA goes one step further, and recommends that contact lenses not be exposed to any kind of water, including tap water, oceans, lakes, hot tub, and showers.
Swim Goggles
If you insist on wearing your contact lenses while swimming, the best way to reduce your risk of eye irritation is to wear waterproof swim goggles. These goggles work by creating a seal between your eyes and the water you are swimming in.
Another suitable option would be prescription swimming goggles. These swimming goggles are custom made with the same prescription as your contact lenses. As such, they will correct your refractive error while allowing you to see underwater.
Sports
As fun as sports are, they can be dangerous not only for your body but also your eyes. Most sports require the use of an airborne object, and as we all know, every airborne object is on a potential one-way crash course with our eyes.
To protect your eyes during sports, be sure to wear the appropriate safety gear. Whether that is a protective mask, a visor, or safety goggles, wearing the appropriate gear is important.
Have you ever watched professional sports? These athletes are the best of the best when it comes to their particular sport, and even they are wearing protective gear. Why wouldn’t you?
Corrective Lenses Suitable for Sports
If you wear corrective eyeglasses but can’t fit them underneath your helmet, visit Nicola Eye Care. We are equipped to provide you with eyeglasses that are specifically designed for sports.
If this option isn’t suitable for you, discuss the possibility of switching to contact lenses with one of our Optometrists.