Well, if you look with your head down but eyes remain forward, it'd be almost like looking up, and your eye lids are merely covering part of your cornea, almost like squinting, so light focuses in on a smaller part of your cornea, if that's what you mean.
"Symptomatic Corneal Topographic Change Induced by Reading in Downgaze"
wow!! you might be getting somewhere, I think I tend to do this downgazing thing too when I have my glasses on, that could be why, though it doesn't do it when I read for a long time w/ my glasses off. I wonder if an improper prescription could exaggerate this; last time the doc somewhat arbitrary increased the cylindrical power in an attempt to get rid of my double vision, but didn't work. So aside from my double vision, I could be reading with higher cylindrical power than I actually need. I'm going to get my eyes checked again soon.
What does your ophthalmologist say about this? Did he/she give you any idea of the cause, or the solution?
Nancy T I have a simmilar ghosting problem. About the head position if I tilt my head upward my ghosting actually gets worse, but if I tilt my head downward at a certain point it disappears completely and abruptly.
Your situation of having temporarily sharper vision after removing your glasses sounds very strange, too.
I still think my problem could be temporary change in the cornea--I found an article online by Golnik and Eggenberger titled "Symptomatic Corneal Topographic Change Induced by Reading in Downgaze" that seems to fit me at least partly. Apparently the pressure of the eyelids on the cornea when you're looking down may temporarily change the cornea shape?
However, I don't understand how that would account for the ghosting being so much worse (and appearing without reading) when I'm very sleep-deprived.
It's a mystery. Some things the doctors just can't explain. I saw an ophthalmologist, who called in a neuro-ophthalmologist (who wasn't really interested and spent about five minutes in the room!), and both of them said they did not know what was causing this and apparently they had never seen a case like this. But the glasses the ophthalmologist prescribed solved my reading problem.
Another question for you--do you find that your ghosting is affected by head position? When I tip my head upward and it reaches a certain angle, my ghosting disappears completely and abruptly. (But it's not a comfortable position for reading!)
Nancy T.
Just a totally blind guess, I wonder if it's more or less internal and having to do with internal structures in the eyes, as focusing with glasses (in my case) and reading/etc. (in your case) requires the eyes to be active. It's unlikely the cornea itself is being dynamic here...so I suspect it could just be something internal. My "sharp" images after glasses removal also eventually regresses back to blurry, both actual+ghost.
that's a very interesting phenomenon that you have on/off ghosting. My ghosting is constant, with or without glasses, but what's realllyyy weird about it is that before putting on my glasses, the actual image is blurry, and ghosting somewhat equally blurry; but after about 1 hr+ of wearing glasses, I remove them, and both images appear somewhat sharper (but certainly not comfortable). The only thing we have in common is this dynamic nature of what we're seeing, which I cannot explain, but find intriguing. Unfortunately, I do not have answers.
There is something about my eyes--presumably the cornea--that changes when I read looking down (not when I read straight ahead, as on the computer), because after a couple of minutes of reading with my eyes downward, I get vertical ghosting, in both eyes separately. When I stop reading, the ghosting gradually disappears (unless I'm sleep-deprived, in which case the ghosting is worse, doesnt' go away and doesn't even need reading to make it start).
Are you saying that your vision is sharper WITHOUT glasses?
An ophthalmologist and neuro-ophthalmologist finally figured out that my ghosting is a refractive problem (it disappears when I look through their pinhole) and gave me some glasses that, when I wear them while reading looking down, prevents the ghosting from occurring. (Don't ask me what's "in" the glasses, because I don't know.)
I never had anything done to, or happen to, my corneas or eyes--no injuries, surgeries, disease, etc. I have never used contacts, only distance glasses since college and reading glasses since mid-40s.
Nancy T.
that's very interesting, I actually have a tangentially related problem. I still have double vision in each eye (due to long term noncentered orthoK wear), and when I put on glasses and take them off after a while, I notice that the images, real and ghost, become more distinct, whereas before, the real image is much more blurry. But eye docs have established that it is a problem with my cornea. I wouldn't be surprised if wearing eye glasses causes internal structures in my eye to focus in a certain way, and is retained temporarily when I take them off. The last eye doc I saw suggested hard contacts, but I am reluctant to commit to those.
What would cause an "irregular corneal surface," and why would it be "off and on" (as rocasan said) instead of constant?
If there is such an "irregular corneal surface," could it be in both eyes?
Nancy T.
Double vision in just one eye (meaning when you close the good eye you see double out of the open eye) is not common. Most often it is due to an irregular corneal surface and this can be diagnosed with a map (topography) of your eye. this can show irregular astigmatism and if this is the cause, the double vision when be eliminated with a hard contact lens, used as a diagnostic test and possibly this could help you. Monocular double vision can also come from a cataract. You need a good exam by an EyeMd to help figure out why you are experiencing this. Try to see an EyeMd who perfroms LASIK as they will have the equipment to help diagnose the cause of your problem.