does anyone ever get severe eye pain whenever you look at screens

Hello everyone, today I want to share with you all a story, something that happened and co tinges to happen to me

Well to anyone cares to read a long post and listen. I'm also making a YouTube video about it that I will post separately if people prefer to listen that way.

I am talking this story to ask for help. For anyone who has ever experienced anything similar and how they manage it and if they no longer have it how did they improve. It seems like a rare thing so I don't expect much but I am doing everything I can to find help since the doctors won't do anything. At the very least I ask people to share this or copy and paste it so more people can see it and increase the chances of me getting help

I am not writing this for attention nor do I want any sympathy. I just want help

Have you ever just being watching TV. Or playing a video game or something and suddenly your eyes get sore. Making it more difficult to carry on looking at the screen. For most people they go to sleep and it is gone in the morning.

It started for me in college back in 2015. There was a random point where I'd being watching a lot of TV and suddenly my eyes became extremely sore and visibly bloodshot and I could no longer watch it. When I woke up the next day it was still the same. Despite my eyes being rested all night my eyes were still horribly saw and when I turned my bedroom light on I had to instantly push my head down as the bright light was unbearable on my saw eyes. I thought my eyes would adjust in a few minutes but they did not. I suddenly noticed that every bit of light I saw bothered me. It really bothered me. My mum drove me to college that morning. It was dull raining and just very bad weather and all cars had their headlights on. Each and every headlight was horrible on my eyes as they went past I had to duck my head down in the car. When I got to college the lights in every room caused me sore eyes more pain in lessons the whiteboard screen we all had to look at for the slide show caused me extreme pain. I spend most of my time looking away and squinting my eyes. All I wanted to do was to lay in a dark room and cover my eyes and shield them from the horrible light .

This lasted for a couple of weeks but gradually got better bit by bit each day and I though the problem was over with. However a few weeks later it started again but this time it was a bit different as it was not just soreness this time my eyes started to ache really badly. Its hard to describe the pain as I have never felt anything like it. My eyes felt really heavy and were just in constant pain. I have had every type of pain in the eye imaginable. It has made my eyes sting really badly. A sharp shooting pain through my eye as if someone is stabbing me in the eyes and all different kinds of pain. Each time it would last for 2 or 3 weeks then go away.

But then in January 2017 thats when it really hit me. I was at a friends for the night watching films having not had any of the pains in my eyes for a few weeks and the next morning when I woke up my eyes were basically hell. Every kind of pain imaginable was in my eyes all at once. This time even after a month it did not go away. It lasted for about 8 whole months of constant agony. Everyday was hell and it was more like barely surviving than living.

After about a month when I realised it wasn't going to go away I went to the doctors. My gp. Many many times. They thought it could be dry eyes and given me 7 different types of eye drops. 3 different types of Eye ointment and 2 different types of eye gel. None of which actually did much good. The eye drops soothed the dryness but that was about it I was still in absolute agony everyday. So they finally referred me to an eye specialist which took months.

To give you an idea what it was like for me back then I basically woke up in severe pain. Braved it went to college. Every single light irritated me and caused me even more pain . Be that car lights , classroom lights , whiteboard lights or phone lights and anything else you could think of. The whole time just desperate to get home so I can get back into my Dark room and lay down with things covering my eyes such as a cloth or my shirt, blankets and whole covers. Even the slightest bit of light bothered me. Even if I was in my dark room alone covering my eyes and someone came in and turned the light on such as my mum to put some clothes away it was painful for me even when my eyes were covered and I was desperate for whoever it was to finish and leave turning the light off. I spent my evenings and most of all my weekends listening to YouTube videos. Podcasts and radio. No way to live really

I watched no TV whatsoever, no films, no time ony my phone. No laptops or anything. And if you think about it everything is using screens these days. Almost everything you do is using a screen. Wether that be to watch something, communicate with someone, to go online or for general entertainment. I think if most people even had to go a few days without looking at any screens at all they would struggle let alone months. I could not watch any of my favourite TV shows that I have watched for years. I could not watch my beloved football teams who I had supported for years. I could not watch new films. I could not play any of my favourite video games. And some people can do these things all day every day such as gamers who sit an inch away from a big screen almost 24/7.

Friends invited me to go to their house to watching things or play video games. Or asked me to go to the cinema and I always had to say no. It was affecting everything I did. Eventually college were notified and they printed out things for me so I didnt have to look at screens. Thought it didn't stop the harsh college lighting from causing me a lot of pain everyday. And in IT it was especially difficult as I had to have a woman type for me and I tell her what to write. Not being able to see it for myself.

So when I actually got to the eye specialists I was seen by a woman who used this machine to look into my eyes. After about 2 minutes she told me my eyes were healthy and there was nothing wrong with me. I was probably imagining the pain and should seek psychological help. Basically saying I can't see anything at a glance so your making it up. in agony allday everyday and I was just given no help. Told that there soothing their and to just leave. An absolute joke I felt so uncared for and abandoned, I was like just because you can't see anything doesn't mean there isn't anything wrong and you are really going to leave me like this ? Thanks a lot. Shows how much you care. The fact that she told me it was all in my head made me feel like I was crazy. It made me even more depressed than I already was.

Few weeks after that u did not want to live anymore life was hell. Just constant pain and no one cared. And thats the point where I got a bunch of pills together and tried to take my own life. There just seemed like no other way out. I was not too far off succeeding.

A month or so after I tried this the pain actually subsided after 8. months of hell. I was so relieved but lived in constant fear of it coming back. And if I watch TV or play any video games or go on my laptop for q few hours it always threatens to come back and now is doing so a lot of the time again.

All of you who know me no I have a part time job but aside from that I have always wanted to be an author. I have started working on the foundations if a book but now basically never get to work on it as my eyes are in too much pain to do it or become too painful a short time after trying to work on it. I can not even do what I have always wanted because of this. Simple things like watching TV with my girlfriend are beyond me she watches it while I cuddle her with a blanket wrapped around my hair to cover my eyes. Its ridiculous.

I eventually found online a few people who described their experiences and they where almost identical to mine. They found similar issues in that their doctors and eye specialists said there was nothing wrong. But eventually found someone who diagnosed them with something called convergence insufficiency and got treatment for it and now are a lot better. However I do have issues with this diagnosis as I have tried the main excersizes that it says online to improve convergence and had little effect for me

I can't even play my fav video games. Ite so sad what I have become I need help from anyone who has ever experienced anything similar. To tell me how they treated it and got through it. I beg of you. All I want is for some actual help.

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