I have been wearing contact lenses on and off since I started during matriculation. Sometimes, I had a free semesters where I don’t wear any contacts at all. But this semester, I joined a trial with a pair of free plano coloured contact lens contact in jewel gold (which under normal light, was brown but in sunlight, it glittered).
However, after several times of follow-up, I was being confirmed by two lecturers for having a poor blinking habit. I had observed my family and I found that almost all of them had partial blinking even my baby nephew.
Among all, I only found these from an optometry advice site at http://www.andrewgasson.co.uk/
Steps for correct blinking exercises
1. RELAX. In order to relax the eye muscles you must yourself be totally relaxed and at ease. Throughout the exercise it is very important not to force any eye movements. A forced movement causes muscle tension, which can be sensed by the fingertips. Instead, the eyes should close and open naturally with a smooth fluid motion. The correct posture for the exercise is simple. The head should be held upright and erect with the eyes directed straight ahead. But do not concentrate on looking ahead when the eyes are closed, as this tends to force unnatural eye movement.
2. CLOSE. The eyes should be closed slowly and gently, in a fluid motion, as if you were closing them to fall sleep. If you are relaxed as in step one, this should not be a difficult task to perform. The fingertips will detect any deviation from the correct closing procedure as unwanted muscle tension. If tension is sensed, concentrate on closing ‘in slow motion’ as if slowly falling asleep.
3. PAUSE. At the completion of the closure, pause for approximately a count of three. This will allow the upper lid to complete full closure. In this way, you will begin to learn the feeling of complete lid closure. A ‘hidden movement’ of the eyes during the pause will also be sensed if the exercise is performed properly.
4. OPEN. Open just slightly wider than normal but this movement should not be accentuated to the point of a wrinkled brow.
5. PAUSE. In the wide open position pause for a moment.
Quickly reviewing: head straight, look straight, fingertips at the corner of the lids, relax, close slowly, pause, open wide, pause. The timing of the complete exercise should be as follows:
Blink….. pause, pause, pause….. open….. blink….. pause, pause, pause….. open….. etc…..
This exercise, should be performed regularly 15 times a day, or as otherwise prescribed, with each practice period consisting of 10 correct blinks. This will require just a few minutes of your time per day. Within three to six weeks your blinking habits should improve greatly and you should then progress to a maintenance programme of about five practice periods per day. You should make an effort to incorporate these exercise periods into your daily schedule, much the same as brushing your teeth. The exercises can be performed with and without contact lenses, but not while engaged in situations requiring concentrated attention such as reading or driving.
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For now, I had a slight corneal staining in one eye and need to improve my blinking habit.
Ok, its downright annoying but this gave me a slight insight on eye issues among contact lens users who don’t even go to clinic (FYI, the optometry shops is NOT a clinic) and you should have your lenses check (yes, they will check your lens for you if it irritates you to high heavens) and your eye surface.
If you don’t mind having final year optometry students (bachelor degree not diploma) to check your eyes, you could arrange an appointment with National University of Malaysia’s optometry clinic at the KL branch. The contact lens clinic opens only on Monday and Friday but if you are free on any other day, you could go and have your file readied first.
Klinik Optometri, UKM KL,
Jalan Raja Muda Abdul Aziz
50300 Kuala Lumpur
How to go:
Drop off to Chow Kit Monorail, head to the side facing Jalan Raja Muda Abdul Aziz road and take a brief walk towards the KL campus and ask the security guard on how to get to the clinic.
Its open to all citizens and its basic service and consultations are FREE.
In my experience, I rather go to this clinic to purchase any solutions or eye drops as they are a lot cheaper than in pharmacy. But according to my friends, the KL clinic has a rather limited choices for spectacles (the one in PPUKM is much larger anyway) and the orders usually came rather late. So, if you really need spectacles in less than a few days, you could get your eyes check at the clinic and copy your eye prescriptions and then go to the opto shop. Its much more preferable this way as usually the opto shops usually gives me wrong eye prescription rather frequently and the opto students gave a more thorough examination including eye staining test.
Take Me To The Circus 