When you gaze at a golden sunset while sitting poolside on a warm summer’s day or watch lovingly as your children they take their first hesitant steps on their own. Your eyesight does so much for you, and yet most women don’t think twice about their eyes or how to keep them healthy.
The truth of the matter is though that there are 37 million people worldwide that suffer from blindness, and about two-thirds of them are women. Women tend to have a genetic predisposition to developing eye conditions and often ignore the warning. However, more than three-fourths of the eye conditions that we suffer from can be easily prevented with regular eye exams and a healthy lifestyle.
So what exactly can you do to keep your eyes healthy and able to see the things around you clearly? For starters, if you’re a smoker, quit the habit immediately. You probably already know the negative affects that smoking can have on your body when it comes to lung cancer and heart disease. What you probably don’t know is that in addition to these devastating diseases, smoking has also been directly linked to cataracts and age-related macular degeneration or AMD, a disease that will eventually cause you to lose your sight completely.
Another lifestyle change you can work on is keeping yourself and your family at a healthy weight. That’s right. Being overweight has been known to cause Type 2 Diabetes, which can have a huge impact on your eyesight and can lead to cataracts and diabetic retinopathy, which is when damage occurs to the retina. Symptoms can include blurred vision, floaters, and even blindness.
In addition to seeing an eye doctor on a regular basis, there are several warning signs of eye conditions that you should be aware of. These include the following:
• A decrease in your vision, such as issues reading or watching TV, or trouble seeing to the side.
• Floaters in your vision or flashes of light
• Eye pain of any kind including persistent pain or pain when touched
• Redness or drainage of the eye
• Double vision
• Seeing halos around lights
Any of these symptoms are clear warning signs that something is not right with your eyes, and you should schedule an appointment with your eye care professional immediately.
With just a few simple changes in your lifestyle and an added awareness to the issues that can affect your eyes, preventing eye conditions before they can become a serious problem should be a much easier task for you and your family.