Glasses... eugh.

mondo said:
Anyone know how bad your eyes have to become before your not allowed to drive anymore?
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Not sure, on older licenses it's probably decided upon expiry or if you develop a medical condition that requires disclosure with the DVLA. New licences have shorter durations and I imagine when you apply to renew the DVLA will ask if you have any eyesight prescriptions since being given your first license which will determine whether or not your license requires you to wear glasses when driving.

rG-tom said:
just get contacts, glasses are crap and uncomfortable. I wear acuvue oasys hydraclear, which i can and have worn for days on epic weekends without discomfort! Could never wear glasses again.
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Not really keen on the idea of contacts as my eyesight is only problematic when looking long distances. Most of the time I'm only looking short distances and the benefit of glasses if that I won't have to wear them very often.
 
mondo said:
Anyone know how bad your eyes have to become before your not allowed to drive anymore?
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Only eye test anyone seems to get is

"Can you read me the number plate on that car"

and if you fail that, you fail.

Aside from that, have a squint though here, has eye standards for various wossits like army, police if you click through the left hand side.


Also, you never said what kind of lenses your dad has if hes paying £300-400 on his.

My dad has varifocal photochromatic lenses and naturally they cost more than my simple scratchproof ones which by the way were about £80 for two.
 
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Street said:
Thats about the same prescription I am. Does the laser surgery mean you don't have to wear glasses anymore? How much did it cost you if you don't mind me asking?
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Yep, no glasses at all. May need some 20 years down the line for reading, but that's due to general aging, needing reading glasses etc. and nothing to do with the surgery.

Cost me about 330 for both eyes (for the more advanced procedure which is more exp. but leads to better results apparently. Can go cheaper if you really wanted), but I got it done in India :)
 
rG-tom said:
another arguement for contacts, no loss of peripheral vision
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Absolutely. That's really the main thing you notice when you switch between them, for me. With contacts, you don't have to move your head as much - not that you actually really notice you have to compensate the other way when wearing glasses, though, as it just becomes normal.
 
Some people have much worse eye sight. Wearing glasses is hardly a major hinderence in life. Man up and learn to touch your eyes and put contacts in. :)
 
I got glasses for the first time 2 years ago with my prescription being:

.. SPH CYL AXIS
R 0.50 1.25 98
L 0.50 0.75 86

I wouldn't be without them now, especially for television/movie watching. I am quite a movie buff and they just make everything so much crisper. It's like going from watching vhs to bluray :)
 
Alright mate,

I work at Specsavers as a dispenser. With a prescription such as a -0.50 it really isn't anything too strong at all. If you were to get any or not is upto you but if you did I'd only wear them for things like driving or as you said when your eyes are feeling sore after a long day using the computer etc.

I'm a -0.50 -0.25 Cyl in both eyes and I hardly ever wear my glasses as I don't drive. I do wear them though (if I remember) when I'm watching footy in the pub or at the cinema.

The glasses won't make your eyes worse and you won't depend on them either. They just help a little and you may just realise how much more comfortable your vision could be. With you being quite young your eyes will accomodate for your short sightedness at the moment. As you get older and yor eyes stop doing this you'll find they'll naturally need more help anyway.

Biggest prescription I have ever seen was something like a -22.50 so your no where near blind mate, don't worry.

As for things like the extra options, it really depends what the glasses are going to be used for and how often your going to wear them. The anti-glare coating is a good thing to have and I'd recommend it to most people apart from those that use their glasses just for reading, it'll really help with driving and computer use. Other than that though you don't really need anything else if your going to be using them occasionally.
 
mondo said:
Anyone know how bad your eyes have to become before your not allowed to drive anymore?
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It's not so much the strength of the prescription it's what you can actually see with it.

It's based on your Visual Acuity (VA's) and which part of the lettered chart you can see in the test room. I'm not sure on what the standards the DVLA set to be honest but I'm sure it would be on their website somewhere.

I'd half expect it to be very close to 6/6 though.

Also I think it's more important to keep your glasses up to date for driving mainly because an insurance claim could be deemed void if your not wearing glasses that are up to scratch with the DVLA standards.
 
+3, +6 here, £70 glasses from Vision Express (with several discounts though, would have gone online otherwise... probably will for sunglasses).
 
I don't know what my prescription is but if I don't wear glasses for distance I find myself squinting away at things. Glasses cost £120 for 2 pairs in a deal at Tesco, both designer & the shades are very cool :cool:
 
Theophany said:
That's where I had my eye test done, I shall be returning tomorrow to get fitted for a pair of glasses. You lot have all sold me on it :p

Is it the UltraClear or the UltraDrive that provides the anti-reflective coating?
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It's Ultraclear. The Ultradrive one would only be ideal for you if it was on a 2nd pair. Otherwise you'd look a bit silly with them when used for TV / Computer as they have a funny brown tint for the drivewear. :p

Don't bother with UV or anything else to be honest. Just the Ultraclear for now and you'll be sound. :)
 
-1 here, I have a pair of glasses (around £50) but I only wear them when I NEED them. I can't read stuff at a distance very well, but it doesn't bother me unless its important.

Sometimes if I'm tired I put them on anyway to make things a bit clearer, but I don't want to rely on them. Opticians advice too!
 
Theophany said:
My old man's prescription is horrific, -2.5 in one eye and -3.0 in the other IIRC and he ends up splurging £300-400 on a pair of specs and then more on single use contacts for playing golf.
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That's not horrific. My eyes are the wrong side of -6 and I'm not paying anywhere near that even for designer frames with high index lenses.

-0.5 is nothing, you'll cope fine without them. I however had fun when I got the flu, sneezed and mine fell off and hit the tiled kitchen floor. I've since learnt that if you can't get out of the building without them on you need a spare pair!

The "if you wear glasses your eyes get worse" thing is a myth. Mine haven't changed more than 0.25 in 15+ years.
 
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MagicBoy said:
The "if you wear glasses your eyes get worse" thing is a myth. Mine haven't changed more than 0.25 in 15+ years.
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I've needed glasses since somewhere in primary school and they did need changing a few times afterwards but between early teens - early twenties it's been exactly the same.

It's much to the disappointment of Specsavers and D&A who like to remind me that it's been a very long time since I last gave them any money/had an eye check.
 
I've needed them since primary school also. They rapidly got worse in my teens and levelled off at around -6 by the time I went to Uni. They've hardly changed since, in fact I went back to some late 90s glasses for a week after the unfortunate accident. Thankfully Mum managed to find them!

My last three of pairs have lasted around 5 years, then started to fall apart. Usually get an eye test when they break and need replacing.
 
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