HEALTH

So you’ve heard it from your school nurse, your eye doctor, your mom and your puppy that you can’t see unless he’s two feet from you… your vision is not so great. And if you want to read the whiteboard without sitting on your teacher’s desk, you’ll probably have to do something about it. Contacts might scare you a little bit—hello, it’s something in your eye—but the next time you walk around a crowded place like the mall, try to remember that about 90% of the population wear some sort of corrective lens throughout their lives. And since you never see *that* many people in glasses, they must be wearing contacts, right?

Of course, whether or not you choose to wear contacts is a personal choice. You shouldn’t think you need them just because you’ll feel “dorky” wearing glasses. (Check out our post on feeling great in glasses to calm this fear). But if you do choose to wear contacts, peep our tips to keep your eyes healthy and comfy.

1. Learn how to put them in. Your eye doctor won’t let you leave the office until you feel 100% comfortable putting on and taking off your contacts. They’ll teach you how to do it, and they might even put it on for you the first time so you don’t feel as nervous when you have to do it yourself. Ask any questions you have, too. Your eyes are not something to be taken for granted, so don’t feel nervous to ask your doctor for any more information about the contacts.

2. Are they inside out? It happens to all of us. You put on the contact, and it feels kind of strange for some reason. You’re blinking and blinking and you can’t fix it. You shouldn’t feel your contacts at all once they’re in, so if it twinges for some reason take them out right away. The easy way to tell if your contacts are inside out is to place it on your index finger and look at it from the side. If the top of the lens is turned out like a bowl with a rim, it’s inside out. It should just look like a “U.”

3. Rinse rinse rinse. The contact solution your doctor supplied for you is super important. You always want to clean your contacts before you put them on. Take one contact out of the case and squirt the solution on it. You can rub the contact clean gently with your finger, but be very gentle. Also, you want to put your contacts on before putting on your make-up. Nothing’s worse than being all decked out in your eyeliner and mascara and then realizing you don’t have your contacts in. Your make-up will get all smeared, your contacts will get make-up on them, and it’ll be a mess. So contacts first, then your eyeshadow!

5. Wash your heads. Just as you should be doing when you touch any part of your face, wash your hands before putting in your contacts! The germs on your fingers shouldn’t touch your eye. So keep those hands clean.

Do you have any tips about wearing contacts? Share them in the comments! 

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by Amy Garcia | 1/21/2018