why in the world do your eyes water right when you wake up
in this video we're going over the top five reasons why your eyes might water in the morning
and what you can do about it let's focus in
hey howdy everybody this is Dr. Neal Guymon, Dr. EyeGuy with the show that keeps your eyes healthy
and your vision clear and i do videos all about the eyes trying to help you keep your eyes
top-notch so make sure you're subscribed for my future videos otherwise let's focus on those teary
eyes that you have in the morning now this list is the top five reasons that i see in the clinic that
may cause your eyes to water in the morning with the last one on the list being the most common so
make sure you stay towards the end of the video to catch that one now this first one on the list is
a more natural response that your eyes have when you're sleeping your eyes are used to being in the
dark when you get up maybe you go to the bathroom and flick on a bright light and that bright light
will cause your pupils to constrict and may also kick in a protective mechanism that will
cause your eyes to water now the extra tears are there to bend and refract the light or diffuse the
light to make the light a little bit more bearable now this type of watering should only last for a
little bit until your eyes adjust to the new light now if this is something that really bugs you that
bright light really irritates you then when you first get up in the morning maybe start off with
a dimmer light if you have a dimmer switch you know start the dim and then just slowly brighten
the light up or start with using a lamp in the corner just to get your eyes adjusted to the new
light when you first wake up and number two on the list is yawning also a natural reaction kind
of like the first one on the list right when you get up you may yawn and that yawning will cause
certain facial contractions some right around the orbit and may contract on the lacrimal gland
the lacrimal gland is what produces tears on the eyes so when you yawn it might compress and pump
out a little bit more tears than your eyes can handle now this one is also natural for you guys
to water when you yawn if it really bugs you can try and not yawn as big when you get up in the
morning and maybe you'll lessen the likelihood that those facial muscles or those muscles will
contract on the lacrimal gland number three on the list is you may have a clogged tear duct now the
inside corners of our eyelids top and bottom we have these little drainage holes called puncta now
if a punctum gets clogged or obstructed the tears that you produce in the morning won't be able to
flow down that drain instead they'll build up and sometimes flow off the side of your eyes if you
suspect you have this one thing that you can do is heat up the eyelids especially in the corners
and also do a digital massage you can lightly massage and rub that area or the corner of the
eyelids to try and get rid of that obstruction or get rid of the mucus that might be there blocking
the drain now this might be tricky sometimes patients have to go into the clinic go into
your eye doctor and have the punctum irrigated they'll actually squirt saline solution to flush
any obstruction in there to get the drain open so the tears can drain properly and number four
on the list is allergies now at night your eyes are used to be enclosed and hardly moving and when
you wake up you might be exposed to an allergen something in the air maybe pet dander pet hair
something that's gonna be an allergen to your eyes and it'll cause these little bumps or papillae
on the inside of the eyelids and those bumps and the allergen will cause your eyes to get red
irritated and may cause your eyes to water now the tricky thing here is you want to try your best
to get rid of the allergen whether it's the pets pet dander pet hair something on your pillowcase
anything that you might be allergic to that will help control the watery eyes in the morning to
take it a step further you can also use allergy eye drops a common one i recommend to a lot of
patients is called pat a day it's over the counter very safe they have different versions of it
you can use that eye drop right when you get up in the morning because this might be something
that you battle all throughout the day your eyes might start watering in the morning but you'll
still have the allergies and may water throughout the day and so pat a day is a good eye drop to
help control that now i made another video about the top five reasons why your eyes might water in
general and i mentioned allergies and i go more in detail in that video so i definitely recommend
checking that video out i'll put a link in the description below also a link up there now number
five on the list this is definitely the most common cause for your eyes to water and definitely
the most involved reason and that is dry eyes now with this one there's different levels of dryness
that might cause your eyes to water in the morning in general with your eyes just being naturally dry
when you wake up the protective mechanism will kick in and cause your eyes to water now one
thing to consider is you might be in that 20 of the people that don't sleep with their eyes fully
close now i'm not saying that you sleep with your eyes fully open all night long but you might leave
about a third of the eyeball exposed and that third of the eyeball will dry out because you're
not blinking to re-coat that surface with tears and that part of the eye will get super super dry
during the night and then when you wake up your brain registers a super dry portion of the eye and
will start flooding the eyes with the tears now dryness and sleeping with your eyes partially open
can cause what's called keratitis or little dry inflammation patches or almost microscopic
open wounds on the surface of the eye or the cornea now the cornea is super
sensitive so when you wake up this also might be painful or feel irritated almost feel like there's
a foreign body or something in your eye because as your eyelids kind of rub over those dry patches
they might notice that something's a little bit different and that will cause the guys to water
thinking there might be a foreign body in there also trying to coat the eyes
with those dry patches trying to heal the cornea now if you're unlucky one of the top
severity levels of dryness is you might be dealing with recurrent corneal erosions now if your eyes
are really dry the surface of the eyeball and the inside of the eyelid as you're sleeping they
might get so dry that the tissues will start to adhere to each other almost like velcro sticking
to each other and then when you wake up and you're and you open your eyes your eyelids will
almost rip off the top layer of the cornea and tear that cornea off now depending on the size
of this rip it can be pretty brutal and you'll probably know it if it happens to you right when
you wake up you'll have the shooting pain right on the surface of the eyes right when you open your
eyelids and it'll cause your eyes to water trying to heal that rip or that tear of the cornea now
usually the people that are dealing with this may have had a previous trauma to the eye or they're
dealing with a dystrophy that causes the layers of the cornea not to adhere correctly so they're more
prone to tearing if you've already been diagnosed with the dry eye disease you want to stay on top
of your dry eye treatments artificial tears are going to be in one of those treatments for sure
and at night time you definitely want to put in a dry eye drop sometimes they have thicker gels that
you can put in there that might help coat the eyes a little bit better if you're one of those people
that sleep with your eyes open they make moisture chamber goggles that you can sleep with that help
with the moisture around the eye to keep your eyes from drying out some people have even gone
as far as taping the eyelids shut depending on how bad that is or how wide your eyes are when you
sleep if you're dealing with corneal erosions you definitely want to be using your artificial tears
trying to keep your eyes from drying out during the night one possible treatment is you can use
a contact lens we call them bandage contact lenses where you actually put a contact lens and it acts
like a bandage or a shield between your eyeball and your eyelid to keep them from adhering to
each other so a lot of people have done that now if you're dealing with this watery eye especially
in the morning especially if it's painful causing blurry vision foreign body sensation i definitely
recommend going in to have your eyes checked out you may be dealing with a more severe case
of a dry eye disease also might be dealing with corneal erosions and you'll definitely want help
to heal the cornea properly also check out my other videos where i go more in detail about dry
eye symptoms and dry eye treatments i'll put that link to my series of videos below and also up here
now i always like to ask a question if you're dealing with water guys in the morning what do you
do to help your eyes do you flush it out do you use teardrops do you just live with it i'm just
kind of curious to see what you're doing out there thank you for watching this video i'm Dr. Neal
Guymon, Dr. EyeGuy focusing on you and your eyes stay focused and i'll see you in the next video