Is there an optometrist in the house?

I've hit the age where I am having more issues with my close up vision.  I've worn contact since 6th grade for my far vision.  About three years ago I told my optometrist that I was having issues with near vision so they suggested multifocal contacts.  The way I understood it was they trade off some far far vision for better near vision.  After some dialing in I was ok with the balance.  It wasn't until much later that I notice that near near vision wasn't good.  For example welding was impossible with the contacts in.   I also got some back up glasses that were single focal.

Fast forward to now.  A few weeks ago while resting from the contacts I noticed that without glasses or contacts my near vision was perfect.  I was seeing details close up that were impossible to see normally.  Someone replaced my nice smooth skin with wrinkles and scars.  So I've done some experiments and came to these results:

Visual aid                                Near                                      Far

None                                      Perfect to 18 inches             Sucky
Glasses                                  Meh to 18 inches                 Real good 
Multifocal                              Meh to 24 inches                Good but not as sharp far distance

So here's my questions.  Does any far vision correction affect near vision?  Meaning will I never have the perfect close up without correct?  Is there a way to do both like wear normal not multifocal contacts and maybe reading type glasses for close up?  My real concern is the 18 to 24 inch distance as it makes working on the computer hard as that's right at the distance I'm from my monitor.  I don't mind dropping contacts and going glasses only.  My thought is two prescriptions, one for outside with the far vision I get with my current glasses and another pair for inside say like my no correction vision but good to like 10 feet?  Help me figure out how to make my cake and eat it too.

Speaking from personal experience only. 
 

Sounds like a case for bifocals. 
Distance correction and close proximity correction.
 

What I have to do is to have a normal distance correction (luckily for me, almost unnecessary), and then have them set the closest correction to be in focus at about 28 inches so I can do surgery at a comfortable distance and not have to lean forward. 

The computer screen is slightly farther away, so that's not perfect, but it works. 
 

You can also get trifocals, but I found that the area of the lens for the middle distance was so small that it was hard to orient to the computer screen. In our office, the monitors are all at different distances and heights, greatly complicating the situation. 
 

They also make progressive lenses that have a gradual transition in the correction instead of the distinct change that causes the lines on the bifocal lens. I've never used them, because they don't work for peripheral vision and my field of vision is usually wide. 
 

The Mrs just uses two different pairs of glasses. On is close and midrange, the other pair is close and distance. I don't want to deal with carrying another pair, I already have two counting my sunglasses. 

I’ll add another wrinkle to the conversation.

About a year ago, my vision seemed to quickly deteriorate. Contact wearer for decades.

Been seeing the same optometrist for many years, so I booked an appointment and did the whole better/worse thing.

Well, he said, I needed new contacts: two steps weaker than before.

He didn’t seem surprised that my eyes needed less correction than before. 

Current setup:

Contacts for normal activities. Super-sharp distance but not so great up close.

Contacts and readers for computer work and light/normal reading. 

No contacts, no glasses when reading for a long time. 

not an optometrist. Two options:

1) Bifocals.

Ask for the kind with a large focal area on the close (bottom) portion - otherwise you'll have to work really hard to tilt your head to see through the correct spot. You still will but you'll acclimate after about a week. Don't give up on them like I did first time. I tried again and have used them ever since. The first couple days.. prepare for it to be really awkward.

2) Mono vision

One lens for close and one for far. Glasses or contacts. Also takes some acclimation but a viable option that many people use. 

Thanks folks.  I'm ok with two solutions.   I'd love normal contacts and then just put glasses on when reading and on the computer.  That leaves my main question of will any far side correction also affect the near side.  What really annoys me is trying to read something and realizing my contacts are preventing it just by correcting the far vision.  Honestly it's not really bad just bothersome.

 My wife has worn glasses since she got hit in the eye with a plastic rake by another kid.  Glasses, glasses, then contacts.  PITA then they made contacts by mail in a bag.  (spectator point of view here).  She got Lasik.  One eye was corrected for distance, the other corrected for reading.  Your brain takes the two and makes both work together.  

No glasses, for either distance or reading, eyes itched a bit for some time after each surgery, but that stopped.  She finds sun glasses are required more often now but they're CVS not perscription.

Looking at someone, the pupil is black.  People that have this done it looks Robo-Man, a gold colored mesh screen iris.  =~ 0

YMMV.  You only get one set of OEMs.

Dan

In reply to 914Driver :

That was one of my thoughts, Lasik for far and just wear glasses for reading and such.  How is her depth perception?

Never changed.

In reply to 914Driver :

Cool.  I looked into it like 10 years ago and that was one of the concerns.

I am also nearsighted and now wear progressives similar to Floating Doc's bifocals- normal distance correction up high, and close correction at arm's length down low for office work. Ninety percent of the time, they work every time. The problem is that lately I just can't focus on fiddly little soldering jobs, can't read the fine print on labels, etc. This could probably be solved with dollar store cheaters but this seems like a good discussion to follow.

I just asked the wife, the only draw back is sometimes she wanders around looking for her glasses (habit) and you get more stuff in your eye.  Sun glasses are a must now.

If you can wear contacts, she suggested one contact for distance and one for reading and see how it goes.  More easily reversed than surgery.

DarkMonohue said:

I am also nearsighted and now wear progressives similar to Floating Doc's bifocals- normal distance correction up high, and close correction at arm's length down low for office work. Ninety percent of the time, they work every time. The problem is that lately I just can't focus on fiddly little soldering jobs, can't read the fine print on labels, etc. This could probably be solved with dollar store cheaters but this seems like a good discussion to follow.

When I need to do precise, close work like suturing an eyelid or after a tooth extraction, I can always put on some loupes. 

Only read the first post, but here is what I am going through which matches your findings. 

- Been wearing contacts since 1991
- My prescription has been the same since 2006 or so.
- Last month I went in to get checked and I told the optometrist I was happy with my prescription, he said try this one with .25 more power. My vision improved when looking far away and I said lets do it. 
- The next week I was getting headaches and realized I could not read as well as before. 

So for me, yes to your statement below:

"So here's my questions.  Does any far vision correction affect near vision? "
 

BTW, I am 46 and never used reading glasses. I returned to the dr and she said, yeah, you need 1.5 readers now. 

I went back to my old prescriptions. 

I had some time this morning so I went to the CVS down the road to try out readers.  I took out my contacts last night so these would be with no correction.  I put on some 1.0s and they made my near vision way  worse.  WTF so I put on some 1.5s and even worse.  That didn't go like I thought it would.  I came home and wondered if you could get .50.  Sure enough they do make them and they're called computer glasses.  Right now I'm trying to find some locally so that I can test them out.  If that works I'll use my normal glasses for distance, .50 for computer work, and nothing for really close up like welding.  

Wait until you really get old.    I've been successfully wearing tri-focals for 10 years.  Close-up, computer, distance.  Still, I wear high powered readers to weld.  Too cheap to get a lens in the helmet.

Wanted to follow up in case anyone in the future finds this thread.

I finally found some .50 readers on eBay and of course the waiting for shipping.  First I tried them by themselves and while not as bad as 1.0s they still were bad.  Then on a whim or maybe drug induced I decided to try them over my regular glasses.  Perfect vision near and far.  Ok great I know it can get better but I'm not going to walk around with two pair of glasses on my nose.  I researched a lot more and narrowed in on Computer Glasses as what I needed.  I finally felt I had enough information to go see an Optometrist.

I set up an appointment with the place I've been going to for 15 years or so.  This would be my first time without vision insurance but that shouldn't matter.  Before setting the appointment I called and asked if they did computer glasses.  The lady that answered responded with bifocals and progressive lens and just about everything except glasses with one purpose.  She finally just said that the doctor would do everything.  After thinking, I set the appointment online for last Monday.  I was near them the Friday before so I stopped in and asked the same question to only get the same answer.  I kept thinking are computer glasses so unusual that they just didn't know about them?  Got in that Monday and did the normal predoctor test.  Finally the doctor comes in when I tell her what I'm looking for she starts with the bifocal/progressive lens thing again.  I again state that I wanted glasses just for near use.  I mention that perfect would be normal glasses for outside and nearsighted glasses for inside the house.  She finally did the what is better test for my far vision and then flipped up a chart on the machine close to me and asked what distance I wanted.  I had already measured me to the computer screen so she set that distance and bamalam after a few adjustments I could read lines that were impossible before.  Just that little glimpse told me that this was it.  Only thing was I was confused because she kept mentioning progressive and bifocals even saying that I could always come back for them as we were walking out the door.

Now is when I started realizing where they really make their money.  While waiting I already picked out some $99 frames so the guy gets them and goes over the options (I didn't want any).  I mentioned their online ad for 30% off glasses and he added that in.  Then he turned to me and said "The total comes to $354.3."  In a public polite way I said WTF.  Then he showed me on his computer frames $99, single vision $120, polycarbonate lens $60, standard anti-glare $120 but it's ok because I was getting 30% off.  Now remember I always had insurance before so I never really cared since it was paid for by them.  Told him that I'd think about it and come back to order them.

That evening I was thinking about it and said hmmm I used to get my contacts online, I wonder if they do glasses.  Sure enough that company had bought out a glasses company so I check it out.  They're having a sale with all frames $59.  The "extras" were their normal single vision free, lens free, and standard anti-glare free.  Add in the free shipping and it comes to $59 out the door.  Well shipped to my door.  I did notice that the mark up for progressive was $170.  That's when it hit me.  The optometrist pushing progressive lens and all that not answering my questions but instead talking about bifocal and progressive from the staff was just trying to make hundreds extra off the glasses.  Now I know to just go in and ask for prescription only.

I ordered the glasses last Tuesday and they came in today a week later.

OMG this is what I wanted.  I put them on and instantly I knew.  The screen is way more readable.  I didn't have many problems with GRM because of the type size and the contrast between the typeset and the background before but sites like https://slashdot.org were just about unreadable before.  Now I can read it without issues.  I've experimented the last few hours and they actually are really good as inside glasses.  I have great vision from 1 foot to about 5 feet using them.  The only thing I've run into so far is I'm in the habit of looking at the clock on my stove while I'm walking around.  Instead of reading it at 10 feet I need to be closer to 6 feet to see it clear enough.  I did walk outside and tested them.  I can see the redlight 1000 ft away better than without glasses but obviously not as well as my far vision glasses.  I've noticed that I'm not lowering my glasses as much to see close up things.  A couple of weeks ago I got an Alienware keyboard at a thrift shop and found myself lowering my glasses a lot to look at it because of different spacing.  Now it's just a quick glance and then typing away.

TLDR - Go see an optometrist but know what you want and don't let them upsell you on things you don't want.  Yeah dyintorace you were right, I just needed to do it my stubborn way.

Costco - no BS

In reply to Slippery :

I do have a Costco card through Grandma Stampie but it's in a busy part of town that I don't go to a lot.  How fast are the glasses made and I assume they're cheap also?

Exactly this. script only from the eye doc then if you're over 45 go get some progressives from 
https://www.zennioptical.com

I've had good luck with Zenni as well.  I'm trialing some new multifocal contacts.  I'm -1.5 in both eyes and my up close vision is about perfect.  I have -1.25 contacts and some +1.25 readers to cancel them out and that's not bad.  The multifocals that I tried first were miserable.  While the Accuvue regular contacts were great, the multifocals just made it so everything was always blurry.  The new Bosch + Lombs that I've got now are like putting silk in my eyes.  Distance is slightly blurry, but I can read up close without any real adjustment.

My optometrist is at the local Walmart one day a week.  He doesn't care about selling anything there and just writes up a script for whatever seems to work best and sends you along.  He gave me prescriptions for three different contacts as well as one for glasses.

If you're going to beat a horse make sure you beat it until it's totally dead.

At this point in our story I have two pair of glasses.  One is my normal far side correction that I wear outside and another is the prescription computer near side glasses that I wear indoors.  Works pretty well.  The optometrist mentioned last time that I could come back within 3 months and get fitted for contacts so that's what I did today.  Only took a few minutes but I walked out with single vision far side correction contacts.  She even told me that I could try readers to see how that worked with computers.  I came home and put on the 0.50 readers that I had gotten off eBay before.  The results were pretty good.  The only issue is the really near near vision.  That first 9-12 inches still misses details like I can't see my fingerprints.  Overall I'm happy just don't think I could weld with contacts in.

I missed this thread, but super happy it worked out in the end. And I'll second (third) the Zenni recommendation--I've worn $6 glasses from there for years. As long as you hold the line against upsells it's ridiculously cheap.

Stampie said:

In reply to Slippery :

I do have a Costco card through Grandma Stampie but it's in a busy part of town that I don't go to a lot.  How fast are the glasses made and I assume they're cheap also?

Sorry for the late reply, usually ready in a week. 

In reply to Stampie :

Glad you found a solution!