Tweet
Hi,
I'm a 25 year old male, who has been been experiencing issues with dry eyes during sleep for a couple of years now. During the day my eyes feel fine, however I wake up numerous times at night with dry eyes, or eyes that have become irritated and are watering excessively due to the same dry eye issues. This has severely impacted my sleep, causing me to go to bed earlier and wake up later than I used to, simply so that I can get a greater amount of poor sleep so that I can feel better the following day.
I've been to doctors that have tried plugs in my eyes, given me drops, and given me gels, but nothing has seemed to work. Refresh Drops work great in terms of helping the pain subside after I've awoken, but nothing has seemed to help in terms of preventing the problem and allowing me to stay asleep and get a full night's rest. I also use vaseline at the corners of the eyelids to prevent from cracking and irritation outside of the eyes.
I had been told for years that my eyes did not close all the way when I slept, but it wasn't until the last 2 or 3 years where that problem manifested itself in these very irritating dry eye & quality of sleep issues. During college it wasn't quite as big of a problem, but now that I'm working 8+ hours a day, I've been noticing more and more issues with my sleep quality.
Last year I went to Duke Medical in North Carolina, where I was again given more drops & gels to try. However, when I went back recently for a follow up appointment after continuing to have issues, I was told that my lower eye lids drooped slightly too much, and that this was likely why I was having dry eye issues during sleep as my eyes were not closing entirely (I don't know why it took about 5 different appointments with eye specialists before anyone bothered to measure my actual eyelids). The solution that they came to was that I would undergo surgery later this year where my lower eye lids would be slightly raised, and a skin graft would be taken from the interior of my mouth, and inserted behind both eye lids to give the eye lids more support to remain at the slightly elevated level.
My question is I was wondering if anyone else had undergone a similar procedure, and their results. I've never been under anesthesia before so I'm a little concerned about that, but I'm more than willing to do it if it will help my dry eye problems and allow me to feel fully rested when I awake the following day. I'm just concerned that I'll have this surgery done, and still continue to have issues, and at that point won't know where to turn to help make my eyes feel better during sleep.
Thanks in advance for any help you all can provide!
I'm a 25 year old male, who has been been experiencing issues with dry eyes during sleep for a couple of years now. During the day my eyes feel fine, however I wake up numerous times at night with dry eyes, or eyes that have become irritated and are watering excessively due to the same dry eye issues. This has severely impacted my sleep, causing me to go to bed earlier and wake up later than I used to, simply so that I can get a greater amount of poor sleep so that I can feel better the following day.
I've been to doctors that have tried plugs in my eyes, given me drops, and given me gels, but nothing has seemed to work. Refresh Drops work great in terms of helping the pain subside after I've awoken, but nothing has seemed to help in terms of preventing the problem and allowing me to stay asleep and get a full night's rest. I also use vaseline at the corners of the eyelids to prevent from cracking and irritation outside of the eyes.
I had been told for years that my eyes did not close all the way when I slept, but it wasn't until the last 2 or 3 years where that problem manifested itself in these very irritating dry eye & quality of sleep issues. During college it wasn't quite as big of a problem, but now that I'm working 8+ hours a day, I've been noticing more and more issues with my sleep quality.
Last year I went to Duke Medical in North Carolina, where I was again given more drops & gels to try. However, when I went back recently for a follow up appointment after continuing to have issues, I was told that my lower eye lids drooped slightly too much, and that this was likely why I was having dry eye issues during sleep as my eyes were not closing entirely (I don't know why it took about 5 different appointments with eye specialists before anyone bothered to measure my actual eyelids). The solution that they came to was that I would undergo surgery later this year where my lower eye lids would be slightly raised, and a skin graft would be taken from the interior of my mouth, and inserted behind both eye lids to give the eye lids more support to remain at the slightly elevated level.
My question is I was wondering if anyone else had undergone a similar procedure, and their results. I've never been under anesthesia before so I'm a little concerned about that, but I'm more than willing to do it if it will help my dry eye problems and allow me to feel fully rested when I awake the following day. I'm just concerned that I'll have this surgery done, and still continue to have issues, and at that point won't know where to turn to help make my eyes feel better during sleep.
Thanks in advance for any help you all can provide!