This is really interesting I have reasonably bad eyesight, but haven't ever tried contacts, so I think I might ask about them too

Oh, thanks for letting me know - i'll bear the gas permeable lenses in mind for the future I haven't got my new glasses yet, so I can't comment on whether the reading glasses make any difference to music reading - but, and I may be wrong here, I think that they are undercorrecting my vision by about +3, so the prescription in them is round about -3ish, which means that I can't see anything beyond about 1 metre away, if I remember from the optician's chair. So I'll let you know whether I can actually see the music stand with them Otherwise I'll just wear my normal glasses as usual - I'm certainly not convinced about these reading glasses

Well, I now have my new glasses - the distance ones are great; I can see really clearly and so on But the reading glasses.... well I can't see when I look up over a book, or if someone comes in to talk to me or something and I turn round to face them, I really really really can't see anything! I'm going to keep wearing them, to see if I can get used to them, but at the moment they seem horribly impractical! Maybe when I go back to school and do some serious studying for hours on end they'll be more useful? I dunno... Oh, and reading music is pretty much impossible with the reading glasses, unless I stand literally on top of the stand - I like to stand probably at least a metre away from the stand. Do you think this counts as distance reading?

I plumped for varifocals, so the same pair assists me to read comfortably and see far distance. Took some getting used to, and of course the "windows" in the specs are relatively small compared to a pair of glasses used for one purpose.

Agree with stetenorve. I'm on my 2nd pair of varifocals and after an initial, very short, familarisation period, th are excellent.

Hmmm...varifocals sound interesting, thanks! The thing is though - I can actually see to read with my normal glasses - it;s basically an experiment to stop me getting any more short-sighted. Oh, and on collecting my glasses, I was told that the distance ones are actually under-correcting my vision by a fair bit, as another attempt to slow it down. Has this happened to anyone else before? Thanks.

I started wearing glasses at the age of 11 (after starting to learn music at the age of 10) and doing a lot of computer work. However, at the age of 16 I was diagnosed with Keratoconus and now at the age of 22 I am legally blind in one eye. I have had hard contact lenses recommended to me in order to try to improve my vision but due to the steepness of the curvature on my right eye, only my left eye would be able to handle one. Unfortunately for me, laser eye surgery is not an option either it would only make the condition worse, so the treatment for me for my right eye -corneal transplant, however that is currently being left until my left eye significantly decreases -I have a huge difference between my left and right eye. But until then, eye tests every 12 months (along with new glasses -new frames included) as I cannot go without glasses for the time it takes them to put new lenses in). Basically, not cheap.

To put a slightly different view . . .

I have never had to have corrective glasses for distance (close or far) but I do have marked astigmatism. As a result I spent about 30 years putting my glasses on when I woke up, taking them off when I went to sleep and so on. If I forgot them or broke them the world was a blur.

A few years ago I took the plunge and had my eyes lasered (good for astigmatism, not so good for myopia etc.) Apart from sunglasses I haven't worn glasses since.

Now I can see the moon and the stars, small print and fine detail, clear views to sharply defined horizons: I never have to worry about my eyeballs falling off my nose, my eyeballs never steam up, I never have to take my eyeballs off to clean them, my eyeballs don't pinch the back of my ears because they're never badly adjusted and I don't have to spend several hundred pounds every year or so to replace them because they haven't worn out.

Whether laser surgery is right for you is a matter for the technicians but If laser refractive surgery is suitable for your problem then based on my experience I recommend it.

I'm mildy short-sighted (-1.0) with bad astigmatism. That means I have three pairs of prescription glasses for different occasions - distance glasses for normal driving, prescription sunglasses for driving and also vdu glasses that correct for my astigatism only - I should probably wear these for reading music. It's amazing how much difference the vdu glasses make!

I've been told by an optician that varifocals wouldn't work for me, neither would contact lenses because they don't fix astigmatism and besides that there is a family history of dry eyes so contacts are a complete no-no. So it looks as if I will have to put up with having multiple pairs of glasses, but compared to what other people have to put up with it's a minor irritation.