BLINKING: How does one improve their blinking habits? What do "you" do?

[JJdryeye]

Decreased corneal sensation can often lead to blinking less. If you have worn contacts for awhile or have had other eye problems or refractive surgery your ocular surface may be bad shape, and it's not something a regular eye exam can detect because the microscopes they use aren't powerful enough to see the nerve endings in the corneas. I wore contacts practically 24/7 for years and then I had Lasik, and after that my corneal reflex was so bad my doctor could drag a q-tip across the surface of my eyes and I wouldn't even blink because I couldn't feel it.

A doctor told me a Prokera lens treatment can help with the very problem you are describing,and actually improve one's blinking.

[Phillips55]

Yes I had Prokera in both eyes and the results have been miraculous. It's a pain to keep them in for a week and so if i ever do it again I would look into more traditional AMT's that doesn't cause as much irritation and cover more of the eye than Prokera does.

[Nightbird]

Seems like the intention there is lighter blinking which is not what we want?

Hi Bob,

Yes, I can see how you would arrive at that conclusion from reading his notes on the site. My understanding, which he did a poor job of explaining, is that if you use the heavy muscles all the time it results in too many partial blinks. The goal of the exercises is to train you to use the light muscles, which is what we all did before we acquired bad habits, and also to strengthen them. As long as you close your eyes slowly, once you feel the lids meet you can squeeze a little harder if you want to, just not too hard. hope that helps.

[justbob]

Yes, I can see how you would arrive at that conclusion from reading his notes on the site. My understanding, which he did a poor job of explaining, is that if you use the heavy muscles all the time it results in too many partial blinks. The goal of the exercises is to train you to use the light muscles, which is what we all did before we acquired bad habits, and also to strengthen them. As long as you close your eyes slowly, once you feel the lids meet you can squeeze a little harder if you want to, just not too hard. hope that helps.

Sort of, but I've got an area on my eyelid where the oil feels thicker and I have to blink hard to get it to come out, which is developing a bad habit?

[Daniel2]

Would simply closing the eyes for 5 seconds in between each exercise constitute an full blink or is the squeezing really necessary for it?
Because for example, when I use the computer, do I simply need to open and close or that wouldn't be sufficient for a full blink and I'd need to actually squeeze everytime?
Probably a dumb question but I'd appreciate anyone that knows this stuff.