What has triggered my dry eyes in Vietnam?

[RedEyeGuy]

I've been travelling around Asia for the last 3 months and my eyes have improved a lot from when I was in England. I've been in Thailand, Cambodia and Laos and my eyes were fine. I've been in Vietnam for 9 weeks now. For 8 weeks I've had almost no symptoms of dry eyes. Suddenly in the last week my eyes have deteriorated. The burning sensation, the redness, and the constant blinking have all come back. It's not too bad during the morning but throughout the day my eyes get redder until night time they're completely bloodshot. I don't know what could have triggered it because I've been living in the same place and living the same way for the last 9 weeks. I was having the time of my life, I've made so many friends and literally never been happier. It's sad that the last couple of days I've been getting depressed because of my eyes.

I just want to know what has triggered it so I can somehow reverse it. Maybe diet or dehydration? Any ideas?

Also does anyone else's eyes start off fine in the morning but get progressively worse throughout the day until night time when they're unbearable?

[Guest]

I've been travelling around Asia for the last 3 months and my eyes have improved a lot from when I was in England. I've been in Thailand, Cambodia and Laos and my eyes were fine. I've been in Vietnam for 9 weeks now. For 8 weeks I've had almost no symptoms of dry eyes. Suddenly in the last week my eyes have deteriorated.

Any chance something has changed?

Pollution in the air?

Getting less sleep than you were before? (I find my eyes NEED the shut-eye-time of 8 hours per night of sleep... any less and they start to crap out on me.

Dietary changes? Or cumulative effects of dietary changes over the past 8 weeks? (My eyes do best on a low-sugar, low-carb diet that is free of wheat... your mileage may vary of course, but worth looking at your diet to see if anything is different now compared to pre-Vietnam)

Any lifestyle changes?

Drinking alcohol more? Not insinuating that you're drinking yourself silly or anything like that, but I know with myself, if I were to have a couple of glasses of wine at night, my eyes deteriorate the next day. Was just thinking that you've made lots of friends, and often part of socializing is having a drink together... again, NOT insinuating anything bad lol

Also, I notice that if I am having a great time chatting with people, I end up concentrating on the conversation so much that I don't blink as much and it dries out my eyes - kind of like concentrating on anything else (ex. computer, reading etc.) - so back to the fact that you've made tons of friends here, any chance you are having much more interesting/fun conversations and concentrating on these conversations is causing you blink less and dry out your eyes more? If so, you can compensate for this by making a big effort to force yourself to blink lots even during conversations... in time, it can become habit so you won't have to devote so much mental energy to it.

The burning sensation, the redness, and the constant blinking have all come back. It's not too bad during the morning but throughout the day my eyes get redder until night time they're completely bloodshot.

Just baby your eyes like crazy and see if they bounce back - get lots of sleep, protect your eyes with moisture chamber glasses (if you have them... if not, regular sunglasses are better than nothing), adopt a super healthy low-sugar diet that is rich in fresh vegies and fruits etc.

Also does anyone else's eyes start off fine in the morning but get progressively worse throughout the day until night time when they're unbearable?

This absolutely can happen to me, so I know what you mean - can be trucking along just dandy all day and somehow by evening the eyes just crash and go to hell. The only thing that fixes this for me is to go back to basics, and baby my eyes to allow them to recover.