Abnormal Eye Sensations - Sleep Deprivation Related?

[wonderbuffalo]

About a month ago I became pretty sleep deprived for about a week.  I could have easily slept, just didn't have time.  By the end of this streak my eyes developed a constant irritated feeling, I guess something like the feeling when you get some foreign particle in your eye.  It was sort of a sharp feeling like something was cutting through veins in my eyes maybe.  Also the muscles around my eyes felt extremely strained.  I woke up after a couple of hours of sleep to this constant feeling full blown (woke up because I needed to get back to work, not because I wanted to).  But at that point I called off all of my work and spent the rest of the day sleeping or with my eyes shut.  After that day, over the next two days I got back into the swing of working again.  My eyes were experiencing the same feelings, only not constant, and minus the surrounding muscle fatigue.  The sensations came less and less, but still reoccur, if only for 30 seconds, or a few minutes, and then pass.  I can't see any pattern to what aggravates them.  I tried using moisturizing eye drops a couple times, but felt no effect.  My eyes never actually felt dry anyway.  I also do not spend any time watching tv, and little time reading or staring at things without blinking.  I just saw an eye doctor.  She found nothing wrong and told me to use eye drops and said that the problem was not from sleep deprivation, but watching tv, staring at computers, and reading, none of which were activities that I was or am excessively engaged in.  (She didn't really listen much, in fact had her nurse talk to me and do most of the examining).  What could be the problem?