Are dry eyes a thing on keto?

(Aa_44) #1

I just read another post about a member here who mentioned dry eyes. I am about 10 weeks keto and have been having quite severe light sensitivity. My doctor says it’s dry eyes. Could this be the keto? I haven’t been wanting to admit it could be the diet but now I’m wondering if it maybe could be. Anyone with experience with this?

(Karen) #2

Yes all summer and still. I’m older so it could be just that and not the keto

(Michelle isaacson) #3

I have experienced this as well. I thought maybe it was the Drier Fall Season in Nebraska.

(Aa_44) #4

I’m hoping it clears up with the omega 3s. I don’t even know how I’d go back from keto. My life is so much better now, we’ll except the sitting in the dark all the time.

(Michelle) #5

I experienced it, along with extreme thirst, in the first few months. At 5 months I pretty much feel like a normal person again.

(Cheryl Meyers) #6

Yes, dry eyes are related to electrolyte balance – up your salt intake. Here’s an n=1 blog about it: https://mouthwateringmotivation.com/2018/02/16/supplements-i-take-on-a-keto-diet-prevent-dry-eyes-hair-loss-headaches-etc/

(Aa_44) #7

Thanks that is all very helpful. After about a month when I started to feel better, I slowed down on the electrolytes I guess from being forgetful. I will start with some salt water in the mornings and take magnesium. I eat 1/2 1 avocado a day, so that should be my potassium, but I will talk to my doctor and see what she thinks.

(Hyperbole- best thing in the universe!) #8

Yup. I used to have super watery eyes. If there was any wind people would ask if I’m crying. I had the superpower that I could sleep in my contacts, leave them in for months. I was more comfortable with contacts in than out. (Opthomologist said it was ok, it’s called corneal bandage.) Now sometimes if I forget I wake up at 4 am in pain and unable to get them out like a mere mortal.

(less is more, more or less) #9

My zeal can trip me up. When I read this a few days ago, my initial, but untyped, response was “Not with me.” Yet, as I thought about it, my eyes always have the “tired” feeling, which I suppose is the same thing?

I have increased my magnesium, sodium and potassium, which has helped me sleep better, and avoid midnight calf muscle cramps. (I hate dancing cramps out at 3 AM) My eyes still have that “tired” feeling.

It looks like I have to dig a little deeper on this eyes thing.

(Cheryl Meyers) #10

Me too – I figure it’s because I work on a screen 8 hours a day, and then stare at an ereader or my phone for hours on my commute at night. :slight_smile:

#11

Weird. My eyes have gotten better. Mine are often dry due to blepharitis and meibomian gland dysfunction. Pretty sure it was the reduction in inflammation that helped.

(*Tame Those Ghrelin Gremlins) #12

I take all my electrolytes it I now have dry tired eyes most the day. Since I started Keto and even still. I go through so much dry eye liquid. I eat plenty of salt as is, should I be having even more? It’s quite annoying actually because my dry tired eyes turn into a headache.

(Bunny) #13

Two things I do for that (production of mucin/mucus; nose, lungs, intestinal tract, genitalia (men too) and that also includes tear ducts around the eyes to produce natural tears):

  1. Type 2 Resistant Starch: (raw sweet potato cut into sticks (don’t peel it; skin intact) and placed in a glass of water in the fridge to munch on occasionally or an occasional ripe green banana; you don’t want to eat a lot of type 2 resistant starch, so if you get constant flatulence {farts}, then your eating too much of it and another tip don’t throw burning hot coffee in your gut on top of it or bullet proof coffee; wait a while let it digest)

  2. Vitamin C from Chili Peppers: if you don’t have access to raw animal adrenals…lol (vitamin C from chili peppers is the kind that actually gets into your cells, man made stuff is like trying to stuff the Empire State Building into your cells rather than the golf ball size particulates you get from chili peppers)

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Beware if you lack AMY1 genes you may not breakdown resistant starch as well as other people. The gene that makes amylase, AMY1, varies in copy number from person to person. This may be the reason some people experience this dry eye thing on the Ketogenic diet along with iodine and possibly iron deficiencies.

(Doug) #14

:sunglasses::green_heart: Peppers for the win!

(PJ) #15

For heart reasons I’ve been on diuretics for… 3.5 years now. (I’m off at the moment but, despite I keep trying, usually end up back on again.)

They have a long list of side effects and one is that they dehydrate my eyeballs, literally. So I have plenty of experience with trying to combat this.

I find if I take Omega 3 (dha/epa) supplements, it reduces the dry-eyeball problem.

Dunno if it’ll work for others. I chanced on it by accident. Haven’t actually seen that noted anywhere.

(Misty Foley) #16

Atomicspacebunny, do they need to be the very spicy kind or will just the lightly spicy ones do the trick too?

(Laurie) #18

Great question. I live in a fairly large house, at the opposite end from the kitchen and on another floor. People’s cooking really bothers my eyes, even though I’ve put weather stripping around the door.

Apparently, being sensitive to cooking fumes is fairly common, but I never had this problem before. And I used to be a cook.

(PJ) #19

I forgot this thread, meant to come back and add “and vitamin A” but I see someone else did.

Self evidently I hope, unless you live in the rainforest or something, most climates desperately need a humidifier in the room where you are if the home has climate control, or doing the winter. That makes a huge difference to my health, how I feel in the morning… as well as to my eyes.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #21

I find that my dry eyes are related to my allergies, not to keto. There are plenty of drops on the market that can keep them moist.