Floaters. If you see a sudden increase in them, get a referral to an ophthalmologist ASAP.
Why?
Potentially detaching/detached retina if I’m remembering correctly.
Not ideal. Get a doctor ASAP folk!
They are not usually related to the degraded retina and usually not treated (i went to the doctor because of these)
Sudden increase is key here.
sudden significant increase.
This happened to a relative and it turned out to be a serious issue, which they were able to deal with luckily. For weeks after I was so paranoid everytime I saw even one.
Worth noting that it’s totally normal to see a lot more of them if you’re looking at a bright blue sky. That’s when they’ll be more apparent.
I got grounded for insisting I saw these when I was younger. I am now vindicated 😎
This seems like a very… Odd reason to get grounded.
Some parents are weird. I once got grounded because I left my room, forgot something, and went back in to get it. Wasn’t even going anywhere or doing anything important. Just randomly got yelled at and grounded.
With my parents it was either agree that they’re right or be punished.
My dad was like that. I remember a moment where my dad couldn’t understand the solution to the Monty Hall problem, so I tried to explain it to him and instantly got yelled at and sent to my room for contradicting him.
Let’s never repeat this bullshit narcissism to our kids if we choose to have em.
Are you coming onto me?
Ah, just kidding. In seriousness though, I’ve chosen not to have kids on account of being so mentally fucked up by my childhood that I don’t want to put a kid through having me as a parent.
Although luckily my dad did mellow out with age. He’d kinda also been equally fucked up by his own childhood and refused to seek help until I’d left, my mom left, and later my old sibling left, and I refused to speak with him anymore. Last year I got a massive, 4 page, single spaced apology from him for everything he’d done, so luckily things are looking up at least.
I pronounced “nuclear” wrong.
Everyone on here talking about theirs going away over time and I’m wondering if I’m supposed to go in for regular scraping as I get older
They’re little bits of debris and fibrous points in the gel matrix of your eye. They don’t go away ever, but they float to a part of your eye you don’t pay as much attention to. They tend to “go away” in people who consistently sleep on the same side. If you’re a back sleeper, or move around a lot, they tend to stick near your macula (your main focal point).
When I run ocular scans on people I can see them drifting around. They’re not a problem unless they’re dense or dark, then they might be blood due to a retinal tear or diabetic retinopathy.
So, in theory, I should be able to get in one of these centrifuges that NASA has, and they’ll all get pushed to one side?
I’ve got some childhood trauma associated with those things that always reminds me of the taste and texture of a mouth full of dirt.
So, uh… trigger warning?
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Among other things, yes
Think thry never go away but your brain ignores them like it ignores your nose (close one eye)
Mine often become visible to me shortly before experiencing a migraine. Is there a reason for this? I’ve told my doctor, but they didn’t seem to react to this information much, just said it can happen.
Not sure about seeing floaters before migraines, but what you see could be migraine auras. I have them and they affect my field of vision prior to a migraine. I’ll see flashy/persistent “dots” or completely be unable to focus on certain things, like I have a blind spot. Hate it, but it at least gives me time to grab meds before the pain sets in. Usually happens ~20-60 minutes before onset.
Mine look like what’s in the picture, but they’re sparkly. And yeah, sometimes they’re so bad they disrupt my vision, but not always.
Is it like a star? I heard it could be a sign of retinal tear.
Joke’s on you, my nose covers half of my view on both eyes.
Them going away is probably an illusion, probably a result of sensory adaptation.
Taking a screen shot with your eyes
just double tap the vagus nerve and left temple at the same time
Close both eyes for 3 seconds for screenshot
Floaters in the vitreous of the eyeball (aka clumps of your vitreous that got stuck together as your vitreous gel started to liquify, which happens naturally with age for everyone).
They’re normal if they appear gradually as you age. Most common in people with myopia. Can be caused by a variety of things including hits to the eyes or head, possibly by steroid eye drops, anything that increases the pressure in your eye, or just plain old aging.
They never go away but if you’re lucky they might “settle” or get stuck to the side. Never happens for a lot of people though, and they can be quite distressing for many people - especially for people who have many large and moving floaters.
Most mentally healthy people will neuro-adapt and they’ll become less noticeable over time. It can take about six months before this happens though and it does suck at first. I got some new ones after LASIK and I was pretty upset. Now I only notice them on light backdrops like snow or my shower. But even then I just notice them briefly and my thoughts quickly move elsewhere. No stress.
For people who are absolutely driven insane by a large number of them, there is a risky surgery to remove them, but if it goes wrong you can be looking at blindness so you definitely need to weigh your options.
The non-surgical laser treatment for floaters doesn’t work. It seems to maybe work for some people in the short term but most people report that it doesn’t help in the long term. It can even create more floaters or break up your big ones into many smaller ones that move more. The laser is also dangerous for younger patients because the floaters are closer to your retina when you’re younger. The laser can cause damage to the retina and it’s hard to avoid doing that when the floaters are close to it.
There are currently a couple groups researching how to get rid of them non-invasively. Last bit of news I saw said a group had been using gold flakes and a new type of laser to successfully and safely break them down. Personally, I will get mine treated if there is a non-invasive way to do so, but I’m not too bothered by them so I can wait for that.
Worth noting that if you suddenly get a lot of floaters and are feeling pain in your eyes or seeing bright flashes that look like a camera flash, you need to go seek medical attention immediately as these are signs of a retinal tear. Retinal tears are treatable but only if you go take care of them immediately. The consequences are not taking care of them quickly can be severe.
For most people, these are harmless and just a part of getting older. You’ll get used to them.
This part bears repeating, as you CAN lose vision in one eye (partial or ALL) due to this.
“ if you suddenly get a lot of floaters and are feeling pain in your eyes or seeing bright flashes that look like a camera flash, you need to go seek medical attention immediately as these are signs of a retinal tear. Retinal tears are treatable but only if you go take care of them immediately”.
For most people, these are harmless and just a part of getting older. You’ll get used to them.
I’ve had these since I was in preschool.
They’re far less pronounced (almost entirely absent, really) now in my 40’s than they were throughout my single digit years, but I still see them once in a great while
Mine disappeared as I got older, like around 25 or so. Now if they or similar visual effects come back it means I need to rush for my migraine pills or I’m in for some serious ass whopping… Don’t know what I did to my old friends to deserve that kind of treatment.
Maybe your vision got worse enough to where you can’t see them well enough anymore
Unlikely, perfect 20/20 vision last check-up (which I did due to said migraines to rule out deteriorating vision as a cause).
Oh wow I used to see those all the time when I was younger but it’s been years lol!
Yet one more victim of climate change
Awwww man. I just now realized that my little eye buddies disappeared at some point. Wonder where they went. I hope it was on vacation.
If nobody got me, I know the floaters and searing, incapacitating pain on the sides of my head got me
Removed by mod
I know they are not parasites, but what are they? Strings of dead cells? Dead optical nerve? Any biologists here?
If it’s a persistent pattern, it’s likely to just be variation in the density of the vitreous humor (eye jelly).
Not a biologist but it’s called blue light entoptic phenomenon. Pretty interesting in general.
Wouldn’t these be floaters?
Hmm it says they’re proteins… I wonder how many times magnification it has to be for it to appear the same size as a tree.
It depends on the tree, obviously.
Or how close to your eye to give the perspective of the same size?
“These are small … but the ones out there are far away.”
For anyone too lazy to look:
Some may be individual red blood cells swollen due to osmotic pressure. Others may be chains of red blood cells stuck together; diffraction patterns can be seen around these. Others may be “coagula of the proteins of the vitreous gel, to embryonic remnants, or the condensation round the walls of Cloquet’s canal” that exist in pockets of liquid within the vitreous.
Fascinating
That’s a different phenomenon from the picture. The picture shows a body in the vitreous jelly. The article you linked is a “brain filling in gaps” phenomenon.
Still, very cool article. I had never read about that.
I see that sometimes when I cough or sneeze too hard.
The first snowfall of this year made me realize the extent to which I have an entire fucking universe within me. Mostly in my eyeballs, apparently. So many white backdrops to highlight them. It was alarming.
I think my eye sight must be getting worse cos I’ve not seen these in years!
In most cases these are left by one of 2 things: small debris on the eye getting blurred and magnified, or as a trail left by the eye being hit by a bright light source as it rolls in it’s socket.
So certain lifestyles almost never experience these.
I thought I was just weird.
Don’t worry, this doesn’t mean you aren’t weird.
I’m so relieved the comments validated what I thought this was about, and I’m not alone :)
XP wallpaper?
