Why Can't Musicians Wear Progressives for Music?

My Musicians and Progressives experiment wrapped up just over a week ago. I'm eagerly awaiting my snazzy purple frames, which will return to me as "normal" eyeglasses. Part of me has been mulling over exactly why so many musicians say that that it is impossible to use progressives for music and also, why I am in that 5 - 10% of people who had an adverse reaction to progressive lenses.

To answer that, I reviewed one of my clips from last week. In the span of of 70 seconds, my eyes flitted rapidly back and forth, up and down, left and right 70 times. In those 70 seconds, my eyes were looking at the music and the choir director from all regions of the lenses - top, middle, bottom, the far right and the far left. Peripheral vision was used just as much as looking at my subject head-on.

To do that with progressives resulted in my eyes looking through the long-range, intermediate and up-close reading range and well as the sides of the lenses that are essentially dead space repeatedly. Visual distortion occurred every time I moved my eyes, which is exactly what happened here:

With such rapid eye movement meeting with visual distortion, it's no wonder I got nauseous. Later in this clip, I tried moving my head as many times as my eyes would move normally in the span of a minute. Moving one's head that often in the span of a minute is also a recipe for nausea (and extremely impractical for a musician). I'd say it's also a recipe for whiplash and inexcusably sloppy playing.

That clip was just over one-minute. Ensemble rehearsals run anywhere between 90 minutes to three hours. To extrapolate, a musician's eyes may move rapidly at least 10,800 times in a three-hour rehearsal. Why was my nausea far worse than my music colleagues who have met with some success wearing their progressives in non-musical situations? I think it's because I use my eyes in a similar fashion when doing non-musical things. If I look at my main tasks in a given day, we can extrapolate how often my eyes rapidly flit around:

1. If my eyes shift 70 times in the span of 70 seconds, we can extrapolate that if read and play music for 60 minutes (my desired minimum, my max seems to be four hours), my eyes will shift 3,600 times in that hour.

2. I use my eyes in a similar fashion when I work on the computer, doing office studio work, writing, researching, transcribing or editing (text, audio and video). I work on the computer anywhere between three to seven hours a day. If I'm on the computer for five hours a day (my average), my eyes will shift 18, 000 times.

3. I use my eyes in a similar fashion when I drive. I drive between one to three hours a day. If I drive three hours in day, then my eyes will shift at least 10,800 times.

4. On average, I teach four hours a day. My vision usage is similar to the aforementioned situations. My eyes would then shift rapidly 14,400 times in that time span.

By my count, my eyes flit quickly - using all areas of my single-vision lenses and contacts an average of 46,800 times a day. This doesn't even include watching shows or operas with subtitles or playing a video game!

It's no wonder my nausea worsened as I forced myself to wear the progressives for longer periods at a time. It's no wonder I couldn't last a week. However, some of my music friends and colleagues wondered how I lasted as long as I did.

A Progressive Exception

For those of you who have been following my Musicians and Progressives Experiment, you'll be happy to hear that I did go to my optometrist's office today and asked for "normal glasses". I did learn a few interesting things that I can share:

1. My prescription is correct. Always good to know.

2. Approximately 5 - 10% of people in my age range (early 40s) do not adapt to progressives. It would appear that I am in that group.

3. This number (of patients who can't wear progressives) increases significantly as patients get older. If my memory serves correct, this number goes upwards to 20% for those in their mid-40s.

4. I seem to know a lot of people who can't wear progressives (oh wait, that's because I know many musicians and other creatives).

5. If you can't adapt to progressives, you can explore trifocals, bifocals and different pairs of single-vision lenses and/or contact lenses.

Therefore, my optometrist was being proactive by starting me on progressives early.

He doesn't feel that office progressives will do me any good at this point, as it's mostly for intermediate and up-close vision (at least, that's what I remember of the conversation). That shoots down my wish for progressives that only have long distance and intermediate range lenses (and then I'd use separate reading glasses). Interestingly enough, it's it's my "up-close" range (AKA, the range I hardly use) that's degenerating first (Note to self: exercise that range more).

I just heard from another music friend. He's a percussionist/conductor/teacher. His eye doctor is having him try trifocals INSTEAD of progressives. In fact, it was the optometrist who said, "

Progressives don't work for musicians

."

I remain hopeful that in time, progressive lens that don't severely limit the periphery will be developed. I look forward to the day that one pair of glasses/contacts will serve my and my fellow musicians' aging needs. That there will be a type of lens that I can wear without having to juggle multiple pairs of vision wear. Someday.

Back to today. I fell back on the non-adapt clasue. Ironically, the new pair is nearly identical in prescription to the single-vision glasses I'm wearing now. They are over four-years old, so they are a little beat up. The old pair will make a great back-up pair. The new pair will make a great dedicated music pair when the time comes to revisit multi-focal lens options.I could have tried bifocals today, but when it comes down to it, I just want normal glasses. 

Quick Links to the Musicians and Progressives Experiment posts:

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment Day 1

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment: Pre-Experiment Control Videos

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment Day 2 - Cooking

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment Day 3A - Cleaning the Studio

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment 3B - Office Work and Practicing Music Meltdown

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment Day 4 - Driving Mini-Meltdown

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment Day 5 - Office Work Meltdown

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment Day 6A - Teaching Meltdown and Testing a Theory

• Musicians and Progressives Experiment Day 6B - Confirming a Theory & Choir Rehearsal Meltdown

• Musicians and Progressives Post Experiment Musings

• Why Can't Musicians Wear Progressives for Music?

Using Progressives for Music Experiment - Day 3

This will be done in two parts. This is from the first half of my day.I had trouble staying asleep last night, thanks to the nausea. Thankfully, I discovered that I still had Gravol in the house. While waiting for the feeling to subside, I did do some research.

Most people who've had more than one pair of progressives say to wear them for as long as possible to speed up the adjustment process. This coincides with what my optometrist's office said.

The second thing I learned was that nausea is normal during this timeframe. However, patients with progressives say that if you're still having trouble after two weeks of "constant wear", you should talk to your optometrist to either get your a different prescription, a different type of progressive lens or to exercise your money back guarantee.To my chagrin, I didn't find out until after I ordered from my optometrist that there I do NOT have a money-back guarantee. I do, however, have a 90-day non-adapt (i.e. normal single-vision wear) clause.

I shall continue on my path to doubling my wearing time each day.

Time Length Goal: 2 hours minimumTime Length Progressives Worn: 3:38 PM - 8:20 PM (5 hrs. 42 min.)Tasks: Cleaning the studio, computer work and practicing pianoPart of the Lenses Used: 90 % Intermediate distance, 5% Long Distance, 5% Near "Fine-Print" Distance (only 2% intentional)

Feelings and; Symptoms Felt: Mild headache in occipital lobe area, gradually spreading across my entire head in a circle as it increased in intensity. Mild nausea today, which increased. Went from feeling disoriented, to "all right" to downright angry.

Video Clip 1: Cleaning the Studio 

Part 2 will cover working on the computer and practicing piano with progressives.

Day 3 Conclusions - Part 1:

What's the point of that bottom part for reading? For me, someone who spends 90% of my reading time at the intermediate distance, that bottom "fine print" range at the bottom of the lenses is useless. I have to go out of my way to find things to try reading out of that area of the lens.

Using Progressives for Music Experiment - Day 2

I'll update this as the day progresses. However, I thought I'd share the play-by-play of my "progressives" experiment so far: Time Length Goal: 1 hour minimum Time Length Progressives Worn: 1:30 PM - 2:57 PM (1 hour 27 min.) Tasks: Cooking and piano teaching Part of the Lenses Used: 90 % Intermediate distance, 10% Distance, 0% Near Symptoms Felt: Like I just got off a roller coaster at Universal Studios with flashing lights - nausea, mild headache in occipital lobe area, which later spread to the temples. Felt irritable by the end of the session.

Using Progressives for Music - Pre-Experiment Video

To give everyone a frame of reference as I start my "Using Progressives for Music" experiment, here are some videos taken of me practicing with my single vision lenses. Sight-reading example:

Drilling a student's piece:

Practicing ensemble music on piano:

Practicing conducting:

I'll repeat these experiments (and more) with the progressives.