Eyes can be sensitive and react easily to bacteria and viruses to cause eye problems. Correspondingly, the environment can also contribute to sore eyes and strain from common irritants such as dust, sun, wind, pollution, smoke, chlorinated pool water, foreign objects that land in the eye such as a flying insect to sawdust if working on a project with wood. If your eyes are often irritated like mine due to allergies, here are some helpful home remedies for some common eye problems that work.
The first thing I suggest to limit irritation, especially any allergy-related eye problems or if dealing with dry eyes is to wear sunglasses or glasses when outdoors. Doing so, helps shield sensitive eyes from coming in contact with those environmental irritants to make eyes water, red or sore.
Regardless of either of these eye problems, you don’t want to use eye drops that constrict the blood vessels like Visine if the eyes become red and irritated. Always use lubricating artificial tears like Systane to bring relief.
What else helps when eyes are bloodshot from conjunctivitis is to keep the eyes clean after washing your face for common eye allergy problems. My eye doctor recommends warming a wet washcloth in the microwave for slightly less than a minute to place over the closed eyes once or twice a day, morning and evening. The heated washcloth helps remove any discharge from the accompanying inflammation like sticky crustiness that adheres to eyelids as well as to clear up the streaks of pink. However, if the eyes become itchy, you change your treatment tactics and apply cold washcloths several times a day.
Eye allergy problems such as those from conjunctivitis can be made worse by your own habits like rubbing the eyes. The reason this can make matters worse is because you’re introducing more possible bacteria and an irritant back into those suffering eyes.
Usually conjunctivitis clears up on its own after one or two weeks. But if your eye problems still persist after that time, you may want to make an appointment with your eye doctor. An ophthalmologist can evaluate your condition and prescribe medication to end your misery and prevent another recurrence.
Styes are another of these common eye problems that can cause irritation. These are those swollen pimples on the outer or inner eyelid that annoy with scratchiness feeling like a small rock is in your eye or other pain. Being caused from an infection, they can also contain pus so do not touch or risk spreading infection.
Of course, you may have a painless variety called a chalazion that results from a clogged oil gland of the eyelid that isn’t from an infection. Again, my ophthalmologist always recommends those hot water compresses several times a day while this is going on. Despite either styes or chalazions, you want to avoid eye makeup until those eye problems disappear.
Puffy, swollen eyes are another common eye problem, especially for anyone with allergies. Thanks to a buildup of fluid overnight, you can wake with considerable ugly swelling that you don’t want to face the world with.
To bring down that inflammation, I have several eye depuffing tricks that help. Splashing the face with cold water helps. Cucumber slices over the eyes, but even better is grated cucumber wrapped in gauze as a compress with all its further release of ascorbic acid and caffeic acid to draw that retained water from the eye area. Slices of raw potato over the eyes are another effective way to deflate swollen eyes. You might want to read my post on natural fixes for puffy eye problems where I covered this more extensively.
Eyes can tire easily when we use them all day. Think how long we tend to stare at the computer, smartphones, television, reading, etc. that can make them burn, itch or water. A simple home treatment for common eye problems like this sort of eye strain is blinking. Every so often, stop and blink. Believe it or not, this can help slightly lubricate the eyes. If that doesn’t give you enough relief, take some time out to apply hot compresses can make all the difference when your eyes are hurting. These simple home remedies for such eye problems will surprise you in how quickly they work.
Dry eyes and eye allergy problems are a horrible mix. To help with the dry eye, adding more omega-3 foods to your diet can help keep them more lubricated. Walnuts, mackerel, salmon, kidney beans, soybean oil, flax seeds, chia seeds, etc. are just some rich sources of these essential omega-3 fatty acids. You might also want to try an omega-3 supplement, but please be careful and look for some sort of industry standard for purity on the label.
Vitamins are not regulated so you need to be alert to best protect your health. The reason I urge such caution is from my own scary experience with a horrible rash that made me so ugly that I wouldn’t have needed makeup if I appeared in a monster movie with how red and swollen I was.
Though you might be miserable now, these home remedies for some of these eye problems can be what it takes to end that needless cycle of suffering. All you got to do is give what I suggest a try.