Painful 3.5 months and counting

[rooneyandfergie]

Hey Emmsy555,

It's very normal to feel this way. I mean it's your eyes. If you feel discomfort with a part of your body that is so important and that you are like using all the time, it's bound to have an effect on you emotionally. I do feel discouraged and depressed a lot of the times myself when things don't work out with my eyes.

4 seconds is indeed very poor for TBUT. As you mentioned plugs won't probably help you because it's more likely that you have a problem with the quality of your tears rather than the quality.

I can't remember why but someone once told me it's better to use a commercial lid scrub. Why not try something like SteriLid? I think it would be more effective and less irritating to the your eyes and the skin around it. Some lid scrubs even have an anti-bacterial effect.

I don't know currently what artificial tears you are using but perhaps you should try using something more viscous. Probably something like Celluvisc. Actually from what i know there are a few types of artificial tears with different characteristics.

- The more hypotonic types like Theratears. the idea is that when moisture evaporates from the eyes, the salts in the tears is left behind on the ocular surface. The salt could worsen the inflammation of the surface of your eye and cause further irritation and instability of the tear film. Hypotonic tears help to lower elevated tear film osmolarity.

- There are others like Refresh that are perhaps 'saltier'. it tends to simulate the multiple electrolytes we have in our tears. I hate Refresh by the way it seems to make my eyes worse.

- There are also some that contain bicarbonates such as Bion. bicarbonate containing artificial tears have been said to help the eye heal from inflammation more quickly.

- Systane eye drops are pretty close to the PH of our eyes. Furthermore it does not merely wash away our own natural tears when it is applied. It forms a gelling web which meshes with our own tears. Unlike usual artificial tears, it works together with your own tear film. It also does not blur the vision so much. I love systane. it works for me pretty well.


The point is not one tear will work for everyone. Some people have found increased comfort by using one brand of tears and after five minutes later apply another brand to the eyes. Perhaps you would like to mix up a few brands and see if it helps your eyes. The key is to prevent further inflammation to the eye. The more inflamed your eyes are, the more unstable your tear film is. and the more unstable your tear film is, the more inflammation it would cause. it is a vicious cycle. If you prevent further inflammation, then over a long period of time, I believe that you should be able to increase your TBUT.

And I totally agree with what Jumpy said bout increased comfort from using the steamer. It helped soothe my eyes as well. I also found that it helped reduce the redness. I did it a bit different in that i added a bit of peppermint to the world. It sorta gives your eyes a cooling sensation to relieve the irritation. You could try that as well.

Try not to feel discouraged. I have been working on my eyes for six months now and it takes quite a bit of time to see small improvements.

[nycdryeyegirl]

HI!

I strongly suggest that you see Dr. Stephen Forster whose office is at (MERSi), Massachusetts Eye Research and Surgery Institution. My eye doctor, Dr. Michael Samson, did his fellowship under Dr. Foster and is a wonderful physician.

If you wish to make an appointment with Dr. Foster, his office telephone number is 617-621-6377.

I have a serious underlying connective disease that is causing my dry eye symptoms (according to my eye doc, my eyes are dry as a bone!) and one of my mottos is that "you have a good doctor who will take you seriously" and I believe that Dr. Foster fits that description completely.

I hope this information has been helpful for you.

Pam

[Emmsy555]

Dry Eye Update

So I'm now 6 months in with severe dry eye. I'd like to say it's gotten better, but so far no luck. =(. I'm still in constant, severe pain (mostly bad burning with a deep, severe pulling ache). If anything, the pain may be worse.

The only light at the end of the tunnel was that I have been able to see numerous doctors at Mass Eye and Ear. I felt like someone was finally taking my pain seriously. Unfortunately, they still didn't seem to understand *why* I'm in so much pain. My lipid layer isn't working properly I've been told, and I'm slightly water deficient (about 8-9 on a shirmer's), no idea on the mucin layer.

I even tried scleral lenses. I was so, so hopeful that they would reduce my symptoms. Instead, as soon as the scleral lens was in, my eyes turned completely bloodshot and even more painful. I just couldn't tolerate them and had them removed after less than 2 minutes. My eyes suffered for days after.

After that I had my eye nerves looked at. It turns out that I have some nerve damage (apparently much worse in my right eye), likely from contact lenses (I just love how no one ever tells you that contacts can cause serious damage! :rawr: ). So, I'm now on autologous serum drops (20%), hoping that it will help reverse the damage and maybe, maybe help my dry eyes symptoms. I've only been on them for a week, but my eyes actually just feel worse. I will continue with them though, I'm hoping that it will come around.

So, currently on: artificial tears, doxycycline, restasis, autologous serum drops, flax seed oil, omega 3-6-9 supplement, multivitamin and hot/cold packs.

I've also been very depressed. The pain has kept me from having a social life and I feel like my boyfriend has become my caretaker, which seems unfair at 25. Also, I am (was?) a visual artist. Whenever I felt depressed, I used to turn to art to feel better with my life. Now, trying to do art makes my eyes hurt worse than ever. I'm actually starting a graduate art degree next week, and due to my eyes I'm taking only half a semester load... but I doubt I'll even be able to do that, and the fear of giving up on a life long dream is crushing. If this is permanent then it's taken everything I love from me.

Sometimes the dry eye zone is a wonderful place. I get heartfelt sympathy, a place to vent and can read about any new/old treatments. However, sometimes I need to take a step back, reading so many heart breaking stories takes away any hope I have.

[Emmsy555]

Thanks for that name- I'll definitely look into that. I hadn't heard that the BFS was helping nerve damage patients.

Also, pain medication was prescribed, however, so far they don't seem to really help. They make my eyes drier and can't seem to control the pain in my eyes (despite making the rest of my body fuzzy). I also hate the wonky feeling it gives me, but I'd pick wonky over pain. =)