myopia reversal

5 Tips for Reversing Myopia

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In my experience so far with reversing myopia, I’ve learned a few things that have made a big difference for me. They’re mostly related to ways you can make this journey easier for yourself. If you’re still experimenting with reversing myopia, below are some tips you can consider, too. 

Tips for reversing myopia
Tips for reversing myopia

#1 Use the Eye Chart Regularly

Put up one or two eye charts in places that will be easy for you to use to check your vision casually and without much effort. (Get free printable eyecharts here.) This tip is actually CRITICAL because it keeps the idea of vision improvement in your mind and incorporates it into your daily routine without adding extra work. Without a convenient and well-placed eye chart, I think I would forget about checking my vision and give up. 

I put one up near my work space (directly behind my computer monitor), so that whenever I looked up from my work/screen, I could see how well I was seeing. The distance doesn’t matter so much as long as you have something of varying font sizes and an easy way to remember how well you are able to see certain sizes (20/40, 20/50, etc) from day to day, and time to time. With this method, you will almost effortlessly start to notice how your vision changes based on the close up work that you do: reading a book versus reading on your phone versus working on your computer. Glance at the chart before you even start working – I found that my vision is often better after I’ve been outside driving or playing racket sports. 

#2 Pay Attention to How Well You Are Seeing

Pay attention to your vision everyday or as often as you can. If your vision is getting worse, you’ll catch this sooner and have a better opportunity to adjust habits that may be contributing to the deterioration. Small +/- changes in vision seem not to be always permanent initially. Conversely, if your vision is improving, then consider what might be helping. 

Check your eyes separately. Pay attention to how your vision in each eye differs. Pay attention to whether words become more clear if you focus your eye on it longer. Or if you see a word clearly and slowly back away from it, does it stay clear? And for how long? People’s eyes work together in different ways. I have one eye that seems to always improve faster than the other one. When your vision varies, think about what factors may have changed it. More sleep or less sleep? Less screen time? Reading more or less or for a long period of time? Or even the sequence of wearing contacts first, followed by wearing your glasses later during the day. Interestingly, I have found that I can see noticeably better in reduced RX glasses if I wore contact lenses (at a higher relative RX) during the daytime.

#3 Use a Computer Monitor

Use a monitor instead of a laptop screen and place it as far as is realistic for you and your screen size. This could also reduce eye strain, not to mention the superior ergonomics of the position. With a monitor so far, I think I may be doing some light variation of print pushing (a method articulated by a fellow named Todd Becker) without realizing it. I currently have a 27” screen that is placed about 90cm, 3ft from my eyes. I’m not the first person to have thought of this, and I recently came across this article on endmyopia.org which is a popular reversing myopia website.  My husband thinks I’m nuts, but I used the same set up for my kids through the Zoom school pandemic and while it looked stupid, at least their eyes didn’t become more myopic during that period. (Luck of the draw or careful attention to eye breaks and screen time/distance, we’ll never know!)

#4 You Can Reverse Myopia While Wearing Contacts

You can continue to wear contacts regularly and still use the reduced RX method to “work” on vision improvement. I got tired of wearing my glasses so often (I’m quite myopic, my glasses were heavy, and it was hard to play sports). I learned that I could buy contacts without an RX on https://www.visiondirect.co.uk/no-prescription-needed, so I didn’t necessarily need an optometrist exam every time I wanted to adjust my RX. Then I bought one pair of inexpensive glasses with a mild -0.25 RX (from zennioptical.com), so I could see better for driving or for any other time when you would like to see a bit more clearly.  

#5 Have Patience

Maybe you’ll be lucky and be one of those people I’ve read about online who seem to experience drastic, quick improvements. In general, though, you really need to adopt the mindset that this process will take place over a long period of time. If you’re the impatient type, trying to reverse your myopia or at least with the reduced lens method, is probably not for you! My experience feels painstakingly slow. I recently wore a reduced RX for almost a year without seeing any change and then out of the blue, I started seeing 20/15 periodically and now almost daily. I’m guessing that will amount to just -.50 improvement this recent year. 

Overall, the more convenient you make the process for yourself and the more you incorporate mindful vision habits, the easier it will become for you to continue trying to improve your vision!

Can You Control or Reverse Your Myopia?

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In my quest to quell my child’s myopia, I discovered the myopia reversal community online. It seems there are many adults who are trying to improve their vision naturally. Yet while the medical eyecare community has not reached the point where they will even consider that myopia reversal is possible, myopia control for children is a growing sub-specialty and reaching mainstream eyecare practices in the US. In Asian countries where myopia is unusually high, myopia control is already a common practice. Considering that myopia control didn’t exist when I was growing up, (and yet here it is), I’m wary of dismissing the possibility of myopia reversal too quickly.

My takeaway

Researching and comparing these two “fields” was helpful for me in deciding how to manage my child’s myopia and also in convincing me that it was worth trying to reverse some of my own myopia. Below are some of the similar ideas that I found between the two areas .

Single vision lenses (SVL) will likely progress your myopia – This is not yet a commonly known fact, especially among adults. On the plus side, as I mentioned earlier, myopia control is definitely a growing sub-specialty and I think it’s only a matter of time before it will become common practice:

  • Myopia control view: Optometrists who provide myopia control options to children know that the traditional single vision glass lenses or contact lenses will mostly likely cause your prescription to get worse and worse. (Yes, that’s the lenses that you and I grew up wearing.) The current thought is that myopia stabilizes in adulthood, but the eye is particularly susceptible to growth in childhood and teenage years since those are “growing” years for the body. SVL are known to cause peripheral light to focus behind the retina, which is thought to stimulate the axial growth of the eye and therefore increase myopia.
  • Myopia reversal view:  In the philosophy of two popular myopia reversal methods, Jake Steiner’s endmyopia.org and Todd Becker’s gettingstronger.com, it is also believed that the cycle of progressively stronger RXes are due to wearing SVL that perfectly correct or overcorrect your vision. If your myopia is worsening as an adult, it seems that perfectly corrected or overcorrected SVL could also be a contributing factor. They call it “lens-induced” myopia

Reducing near work strain is important in treating myopia – Giving your eyes a break from reading a book or the computer screen is common wisdom (that many of us probably have trouble following). However, myopia treatment takes this a step further.

  • Myopia control view – Multifocal or bifocal glasses and multifocals contacts give the child different corrections for distance viewing and near viewing. The theory here is that the near viewing through an add power reduces the strain of close work. Although studies haven’t found much clinical benefit from bifocal glasses as from the multifocal contacts, researchers think it may be due to children not being able to use the bifocal lenses correctly (looking thru the right part for the particular activity at hand).
  • Myopia reversal view – Similarly, many myopia reversal methods also include wearing either a reduced RX or plus lenses for near work to reduce strain. 

Outdoor time affects myopia – Spending time outdoors is believed to play a central role in vision.

  • Myopia control view – Research in myopia control is full of studies on the possible link between myopia and time spent outdoors. It is believed that spending more time outdoors (3 hours/day) can help prevent myopia in children (although studies find that it’s not helpful once myopia has begun). Although there are many theories (i.e., the eye needs vitamin D, outdoor time replaces screen/reading time, being outdoors skews the eyes towards using distance vision, etc.), it’s also not clear why the outdoor time may prevent the eye from growing too much.
  • Myopia reversal view – Jake Steiner’s endmyopia.org frequently posts about the importance of incorporating outdoor time into part of the rehabilitation. While myopia control researchers still don’t feel that they have found the reason that outdoor time is beneficial, Mr. Steiner believes that outdoor time spent actively trying to see things more clearly is the reason that outdoor time can improve vision.

The effects of both treatments are variable in individuals – both research and anecdotal evidence show that neither myopia control nor reversal methods are guaranteed to work. Researchers don’t know why myopia control works for some children but not so much in others. I haven’t found any formal myopia reversal studies on adults – perhaps I just haven’t logged enough hours in the search. Nevertheless, the treatments do seem to work  for many adults anecdotally and definitely for many children.

Resources

This Medium post by an Australian optometrist describes how the traditional approach of glasses for children is becoming outdated and that myopia is becoming recognized as a condition that can be treated:

Two of the most popular myopia reversal techniques seem to be Jake Steiner’s endmyopia.org and Todd Becker’s gettingstronger.org:

Lens-induced myopia was reversible in a study of chicks

Thoughts? More info? Better info? I’m all ears. Email me at:  wishiknewbefore20@gmail.com or leave a comment below.