r/astigmatism

My contact prescription for my right eye is not for astigmatism, but my left is. My optometrist said it's because contacts will correct astigmatism without getting astigmatism contacts. How is that true?

My regular glasses prescription is

sph cyl axis add od -0.25 -0.75 180 os 0.00 -1.00 010

I’ve been on a vision journey for a while now. I’m near sighted with a +2.25 cyl (astigmatism) in my left eye and +4.5 cyl in my right. I couldn’t wear my prescription glasses because they were incredibly hard to walk in, my eyes couldn’t focus properly because of the contrast between the eyes, and they just felt warpy. So my eye doctor dumbed down my prescription to match (+2.25 in both eyes).

I’m still finding my glasses a little uncomfortable to walk in and I just don’t want to wear them all the time, but now I feel blind without them. So I tried contacts. I saw a different eye doctor and he decided to follow the dumbed down prescription rather than use my “real” 4.5 cyl prescription. He also said they don’t really make soft contacts in my real prescription anyway.

I’m experiencing this weird phenomenon where I can’t fully tell if the contacts are helping. It almost feels like how I thought my vision felt before I started wearing glasses, so in some ways it’s nice because it’s the only time I get clarity without feeling distracted by either glasses or just complete blurriness. But sometimes I feel crazy because it’s still not as sharp as I’d like it to be and almost crave the full correction because I love the feeling of contacts. I do think they’re working but it’s so subtle I can’t always tell.

Am I crazy? Has anyone else experienced this or have luck with contacts with high astigmatism? I’m considering XR contacts as this point.

Hi, SO, my last eye exam was in February and from the eye scan I got and optometrist check, my eyes are healthy. Recently, however, Ive been having two issues.

• First issue: Late in the day and sometimes in the day, I have been seeing an offset shadow/double vision of letters (mainly white text on dark/black/gray background) that can be what I perceive as worse than normal. Its visible per eye but in different direction. Vertical down in left eye. South east down on right eye. (not sure if this makes sense).
• Second issue: an increased amount of glare in my right eye when seeing bright white light. It feels like my right eye is smudged more than left? And it can go away with blinking and/or eye drops sometimes.

To deal with this I will use eye drops and sometimes the offset will go away but other times it stays and it gives me anxiety unless I ignore it. I can get into more depth if needed. I called my optometrist and she didnt see concerned about the shadow/offset. I forgot to mention the glare though.

Edit: Forgot to mention that I do have diagnosed astigmatism and my glasses account for it. My prescription did not change much after my last eye exam. Ive also tried overhydrating and that doesnt change too much I think.

Hi all. A few years ago (i think i was 18 at the time?) i saw my eye doctor and she changed my prescription and added astigmatism (don't remember exactly what it was) and I absolutely hated it. I felt like text on the TV wasn't sharp anymore and the signs in the classroom where I worked weren't clear anymore. It was driving me insane. I went back to the doctor and she said some people don't like astigmatism and she removed the astigmatism from the prescription and made it a bit higher to compensate for the lack of astigmatism. This was fine. Now that its nearly three years later I go to my optometrist to get fitted for contact lenses and he gives me an astigmatism (as well as raising the prescription by a quarter point in my left eye). I told him that in the past I've been given an astigmatism in my glasses and I hated it. He told me point blank that I need astigmatism and I will see much better. So I get the trial pair of contacts in the new prescription and guess what, I have the exact same problem. It feels like my eyes are working harder to see, and text on the TV or on Alexa in my home are blurry, as well as around my classroom. I don't know what to do anymore. I am hesitating to order more contacts or to make a pair of glasses with the new script because of this. Is this normal? Did anyone else feel like astigmatism made their eyes work harder?

My dad has an astigmatism as well and I spoke to him about it and he pretty much said that if two doctors have told me that I need an astigmatism, that means I probably do. But I know my eyes and I know I'm not seeing as well as I was in my glasses. But also, this is my first time wearing lenses and am wondering if that can contribute to the issue.

FYI, here is my current contact lense prescription if it makes a difference:
Left eye: -4.50, CYL -1.25
Right eye: -4.00, CYL -1.75

(In your own experience)