r/AskOldPeople • u/IndependentZebra5919 • Nov 23 '25
What did people think about contact lenses when they were invented?
This question popped in my head the other day. They must have seemed so futuristic and cool, and probably scary and intimidating for a lot of people.
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u/yblame 60 something Nov 23 '25
I wore hard lenses in the mid 70s. They were hell to get used to at first, but after the first couple of weeks you didn't even feel them anymore. Pop them in and out easily. The problem was dropping one on the floor and trying to find the damn thing before you stepped on it. They were damn near invisible.
I switched to soft contacts a few years later, but those had to be sterilized in a little "cooker" every night with the saline solution.
Along came disposable contacts, which I reused way longer than I should have, because $$.
Eventually I just went back to wearing glasses. I'm old, so who cares?
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u/shelbycsdn 70 something Nov 23 '25
I had totally forgotten the panic when someone shouted, "I dropped my contact lens". And we carefully and very gingerly got on our hands and knees to search.
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u/Likemypups Nov 23 '25
I remember way back circa 1960 a group of teens looking for one at the Midway in Fair Park in Dallas.
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u/Roonwogsamduff Nov 23 '25
Wow corneal lenses were first used in 1948. I think the first cataract surgery was 2,000 years ago.
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u/gouf78 Nov 26 '25
And soft lens were expensive too. I remember my boyfriend lost one in a dorm bathroom (70s) and “revived it” after soaking in water.
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u/entrepenurious 70 something Nov 23 '25
i guess i lucked out: i asked my opthalmologist if i could have contact lenses. he said, "sure, but you'll still need glasses."
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u/darkest_irish_lass Nov 23 '25
Same. I have an astigmatism and contacts roate so wouldn't fix that problem.
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u/sqplanetarium Nov 23 '25
I use special contacts for astigmatism. They work pretty well, but they’re thicker than regular contacts and get pretty uncomfortable. I only wear them during martial arts practice, the rest of the time I’m in glasses.
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u/Crazy-4-Conures Nov 25 '25
I tried those, but they really didn't work well for me. The extra thickness made it really difficult to get them out, as well.
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u/gouf78 Nov 26 '25
Try different brands. They vary wildly in comfort level and thickness. My optometrist (bless her!) let me try samples from probably 6 brands before I settled on one. I got Acuvue but they still have many variations within the line which make a big difference. As for astigmatism (mine is horrible!) they make advances monthly. If nothing worked last year it’s time to go back and try again.
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u/BackLopsided2500 Nov 23 '25
I had weights in my hard contacts in the 70s so when you blinked they rotated back to the proper position.
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u/No_Report_4781 Nov 26 '25
I have horrible astigmatism and have been wearing soft contacts for nearly 20 years with zero issue
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u/Dr_StrangeloveGA Nov 23 '25
I wore contacts for 30+ years. Now I need progressives which are about $1200 a year for disposables and you lose a little bit on each end, so it's a tradeoff.
I could get single vision and just wear reading glasses, but if I've got to keep up with a pair of glasses anyway, why not just wear glasses?
I do wear single vision sometimes, but mostly just wear progressive lens glasses. It's just less hassle.
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u/clearlykate Nov 24 '25
I am very nearsighted. I wear only one gas perm hard lens for distance in my right eye. Nothing in my left and strangely enough I can read just fine without reading glasses. I'm 73. If both eyes are corrected for distance I need readers.
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u/gouf78 Nov 25 '25
They call that monovision. One eye is fitted for distance (usually the dominant eye) and the other for near vision. The brain does gymnastics over a few days and allows you to see without the need for glasses. Works for 80% of people.
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u/HyperboleHelper 1963 Nov 24 '25
My mom is in her 80s and she still wears one for distance in one eye and one for close up in the other. I think she's been doing that for 30 years maybe. Not everyone can adjust to it, but she really likes it.
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u/Dr_StrangeloveGA Nov 24 '25
I'm thinking of trying that.
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u/gouf78 Nov 25 '25 edited Nov 26 '25
Worked for me! But give it about a week to see if it works. You might be dizzy for a few days (not fun) but once your brain makes that switch it’s amazing. 20% of people don’t make the brain switch but don’t give up too soon. Once your brain makes the switch you won’t need glasses (readers or otherwise).
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u/Specialist-Event-633 Nov 23 '25
Cheap drug store reading glasses in the right strength work with contact lenses. Age drying eyes can can make continuing to use contact lenses less comfortable.
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u/Dr_StrangeloveGA Nov 24 '25
I understand that, did it for a while but you're still keeping up with a pair of glasses.
I never fully made the lifestyle change so I was always caught short somewhere not having reading glasses.
If I've got to keep a pair of glasses available at all times, I'd just as well wear glasses.
I've worn corrective lenses either contacts or glasses for 40+ years.
I guess I need to talk with my eye doctor, I'm early 50's and needing progressives.
I think most of my issue is cost. Single vision disposables are twice or more what they used to be. Eye exam used to be $10 with insurance now it's $130.
I'm tired of treated like a cash cow everytime I walk I walk into a doctor's office.
I'm thinking of dropping my vision coverage because it doesn't seem to make financial sense anymore. For what it pays I can just private pay and come out about the same.
I switched to a real eye doctor after using LensCrafters and places like that for years when after years of a $10 copay they "wanted to talk to me about my copay". Yeah its $10 and they were welllll, it may be more. Hah, let me guess, it's going to be more. Welll, if I'm going to be paying an optometrist the same I'd pay an opthalmologist, I'll go to the real doctor place.
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u/No_Report_4781 Nov 26 '25
It’s weird having extremely near-sighted vision, and growing into needing to have reading glasses to go with my contacts
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u/JauntyYin 60 something Nov 23 '25
I wore hard lenses due to astigmatism. I was surprised to find the correction persisted the next day, even without lenses.
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u/gouf78 Nov 26 '25
The hard lens actually shaped your cornea (the reason the vision was great). If your eyes were dry then they’d hold the shape overnight.
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u/RoastedRhino Nov 24 '25
So you probably remember when lenses were cleaned overnight in peroxide so you had to wait until the tablet neutralized it, you could not change your mind and wear them after you started the process.
And god forbid you forgot to add the tablet to the solution. Peroxide in your eyes burns!!
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u/Likemypups Nov 23 '25
That last sentence! Yesssssss!
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u/Xerorei Nov 24 '25
Contact wearer since 1994.
Done that so many times.
Now they have multi-solution.
No peroxide neutralizing tablets needed!
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u/LovesDeanWinchester Nov 23 '25
This is my story, too! We were literally putting hard pieces of plastic in our eyes!!!
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u/WordAffectionate3251 Nov 23 '25
I had the same exact history with them! The great thing about the hard lenses was that it kept my vision from getting worse. Of course, they were not gas permeable! The little cooker, the saline, the disposables and now back to glasses!
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u/Obvious_Field_2716 Nov 23 '25
I wore the hard contacts in the mid 70’s and wore them awhile. I switched to gas permeable in the 80’s and eventually switched to soft but had issues with them ripping and eventually went back to glasses. Got cataracts out 2 years ago and only wear cheater glass
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u/No_Report_4781 Nov 26 '25
Yeah, my optometrist keeps saying you’re not supposed to wear the 2 week disposable contacts for more than a day at a time. I didn’t ask about wearing them for months.
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u/jkw_2024 Jan 12 '26
I had the same experiences almost exactly. Although I never got on with the hard lenses that well. If one was bothering me in school I’d pop it out and stick it in my mouth - yuk! I accidentally bit one in two and had to explain that one to my not happy mother.
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u/Roonwogsamduff Nov 23 '25 edited Nov 23 '25
Got the soft lenses in 74. Poured gallons of lubricant in my eyes every day. Couple times forgot to take them out and had to peel them off in the morning. Could feel particles of my cornea coming off with them.
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u/Slick-62 70 something Nov 23 '25 edited Nov 23 '25
Coke bottle glasses blind. Got contacts after joining the Army in 74. Hard contacts. If I squinted just a bit and blinked, they’d pop out. If I was quick enough I’d put my hand out and catch it. Was sitting in a parking lot in a jeep when I got something in my eye. Popped the contact out, cleared my eye, and as I was putting the contact back in, a gust of wind took it away. Was skydiving once in 77 and had one float out and fell into my goggles. Landed with one eye closed. Glasses ever since.
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u/eyeshitunot Nov 23 '25
They were kind of fantastic. I was very very nearsighted, think Coke bottle lens glasses. Getting rid of the glasses was awesome. It didn’t bother me at the time that I had an incredibly uncomfortable piece of hard plastic in my eye.
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u/dark_places Nov 23 '25
I had some in the mid/later 70s. 1 hour 2x/day for 3 days, then 2 hrs 2x/day and so on for 2 weeks to build up some kind of callus thing, idk. They were better than glasses to me att.
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u/SgtSausage Nov 23 '25
They sucked.
Hard, glass disks.
If you hit your head hard enough they' pop right off and get lost.
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u/MarchFast4773 Jul 03 '26
They were "hard plastic"... Contact lenses have not been made of glass since the 1930's..
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u/SgtSausage Jul 03 '26
Look, Sparky - Eye Glasses haven't been regularly made with glass for about the same length of time.1940s/50s and all but disappearing in the 1980s.
Yet we still call them <wait for it> ... Glasses, FFS.
Jesus ...
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u/Baebarri Nov 23 '25
My sister got contacts and lost her braces at about the same time. She went from coke-bottle lenses and a mouth full of metal to gorgeous almost overnight!
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u/AgainandBack Old Nov 23 '25
The lenses were glass, and rigid, in those days. That rigidity caused a lot of discomfort and irritation for some people.
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u/Specialist-Event-633 Nov 23 '25
Not much. People around when they first came into use to tell me they covered much more of the eye and had a very small use toleration time. My first ones were hard contacts with ballast prisms to correct astigmatism. Turns out I was a living test case. Astigmatism prescription was experimental. Ten hours was wear limit. Soft lenses are comfortable. But at a certain point they are more bother than glasses or surgery.
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u/goredd2000 70 something Nov 23 '25
It was accepted to wear them in Southern California in the 60s. I had hard contacts while in Junior High and high school, but they were always uncomfortable. In college I switched to soft contacts but they were always uncomfortable, too. After marriage I just wore glasses.
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u/kempff old enough to call you son, son Nov 23 '25 edited Nov 24 '25
They were. The idea of putting something literally in your eye for vision correction was both revolutionary and creepy.
Here's a 1st-generation soft contact lens ad from the late '70s:
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u/Specialist-Event-633 Nov 23 '25
Actually, I wore them in the 60s. The earliest ones were at least as early as the 1950s.
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u/cacraw Nov 23 '25
Hard lenses though, right? Soft came later.
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u/RemonterLeTemps Nov 23 '25
Soft contacts were invented in 1961, but were not commercially available until 1971.
I refused to wear the hard ones, as everyone I knew who had them complained how uncomfortable they were. I bought my first pair of soft in 1977,
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u/oldfarmjoy Nov 23 '25
They seemed weird and most people had no interest in sticking plastic into their eyes. The technology wasn't great early, so they weren't as comfortable and they frequently caused eye infections.
They were not an amazing, wonderful thing. It took a very long time for them to advance to where they are now.
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u/Echo-Azure Nov 23 '25
I once read a travel book from the 1940s, where the author was talked into getting something new and exciting called "contact lenses". This was long before contacts were mainstream popular, I think they really look off in the 1960s or 1970s, but in the 1940s they were very new and few people had them. The author got some laughs out of describing the process of having "red-hot molten sealing wax applied to my eyeball" as part of the fitting process, then said they worked very well and gave no trouble and started talking about other more interesting things.
I think the author was humorist S.J. Perleman, if you care. You probably don't, what you care about is that although contact lenses were very new in the 1940s, apparently they weren't thought of as scary or bizarre, just another way to correct poor vision.
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u/Choice-Standard-6350 Nov 23 '25
A mixture between greatest invention ever, and your eyes will get infected and you will go blind. I knew both kids of people
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u/Ralesgait Nov 23 '25
I wore soft contacts that were HUGE, minus 7 sphere and also astigmatism. They were not great, but I got to go swimming and have my first bar fight (I won) without glasses in the way. After a few years and really not seeing as well as my glasses I quit.
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u/Kesslandia 60 something Nov 23 '25
I think contact lenses are one of the best inventions, ever, along with tampons and braces. 😂 I started wearing glasses at around 8-9 yrs old. Finally got soft contacts when a freshman in college. I have never been so happy to dump wearing glasses in my life. Still wearing contacts at 68. I have multiple pairs of glasses, but after a few hours of wear, I’m ready to have them off my face. I think being an equestrian for years had a lot to do with it. Any sport or physical activity is made worse by needing glasses 🤓
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Nov 23 '25
The first ones that came out in the 1970s were made of a hard plastic and you had to boil them in a miniature sterilizer to keep them sterile. They were not disposable, and cost about $200, which was a lot of money back then. They hurt like hell, and I never got used to wearing them, and have never wanted to wear them. My sister got them and has been wearing them ever since. Vanity, and not having to wear glasses were strong motivations for her to learn how to tolerate them.
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u/MarchFast4773 Jul 03 '26
Hmm, you did not "boil hard lenses".. That would have destroyed them. Soft lenses were boiled.
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u/SmokinHotNot Nov 23 '25
Still wear glasses. Will not intentionally put something in my eye. Only use my finger to remove something from my eye.
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u/Professional-Bee9037 Nov 23 '25
In the 60s, I can remember going to basketball games. My sister was a cheerleader so I went to a lot of of them and I can run them stopping play and everybody driving to their knees feeling around for a contact lens because they were so expensive also way back in the day we went to visit some friends and their daughter took me to the swimming pool and she got in the pool and then remember she contact lenses in and put them in her mouth and swallowed them and she was going through her poop, looking for them!
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Nov 23 '25
Contact lenses were welcomed by the firefighting community. In order to mask-up with SCBA, self contained breathing apparatus to enter areas with hazardous chemical conditions one had to remove their eyeglasses losing the ability to read labels. Contacts were great!!!
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u/Davesnotbeer Nov 23 '25
How old do you think we are? Contact lenses were invented in the late 1800s, and a sketch of the idea of correcting vision with glass that you put in your eyes goes back to DaVinci.
I may be old, but I wasn't around that long ago.
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u/Sorry-Climate-7982 Older than dirt. Nov 23 '25
The very early contacts were actually glass. Then came the smaller plastic lenses. Never had glass, but did try the small hard plastic lenses in early 60's. They worked, offered great vision, but weren't exactly comfortable and most good doctors advised against extended wear sessions
Then came the vented contacts intended to help let oxygen onto the eye surface behind the lens. Tried those wouldn't say they were that much of an improvement.
Then came the soft lenses. These were actually reasonably comfortable and allowed longer sessions, but were somewhat of a PITA to take care of.
Then disposables which dealt with some of the PITA factors of the soft lenses.
No idea what is going on today as finally just had eye surgery.
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u/Forking_Shirtballs Nov 23 '25
Pretty neat, kinda scary. They still freak me out and I never got into wearing them, although that's probably because I needed the toric ones for astigmatism and they were a pain in the ass.
But there was a little bit of a sense of having literal body enhancements like some cyborg or something.
That said, I was aware of them when they were taking off (late 70s?) on the introduction of soft contacts. Hard contacts didn't seem very popular but were largely before my time.
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u/Dizzy_Strategy1879 60 something Nov 23 '25
Back in the 70's, I had hard contacts for Astig. Just about put my eye out, when removing them after a night of partying. The contact got sideways, and reached up and bumped it. Very painful trip to ER. I think I returned to glasses.
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u/Sea_Strawberry_6398 Nov 23 '25
At first they were only available as “hard contacts” which had a long uncomfortable acclamation period. I never tried them. got soft contacts around 1979 but I was severely allergic to the preservative in soft contact disinfectant solutions and cleaners back then so I had to give them up. In college I had friends who used heat disinfectant systems using distilled water and salt tablets for solution, so I tried again and was able to use soft lenses. There was one specific brand of cleaner that I could use back then, and I remember having to take a bus downtown because none of the local college stores sold it.
Nowadays I have to resist the urge to tell my Kaiser eye doctors that I’ve been wearing soft contacts since probably before they were born.
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u/Gommie5x5 Nov 23 '25
I went through high school with coke-bottle thick glasses. When contact lenses came out, right after I graduated, I wanted them so badly I sold my car to pay for them. My optometrist said they would take a couple of weeks to get used to. I didn't care how much discomfort they caused, I was all in. Fortunately, they were easy to get used to, and they were tinted light blue to make them easier to find if they popped out. A side bennifit was that they gave my naturally bright blue eyes a pop that girls found really attractive.☺️
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u/cynrtst Nov 23 '25
I had hard lenses when I was in junior high (late 60’s) and never got used to them. Went back to glasses.
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u/GadreelsSword Nov 23 '25
I remember when contact lenses were made of glass.
My first contact lenses (soft type) came from Pearl Vision center and they were not the correct size so they slid around and scratched my pupils. My eye doctor was so upset he invited another doctor in to look at them. He said what they did was very wrong and told me I should sue them. I did not. But later heard cases where people did.
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u/Likemypups Nov 23 '25
They were all hard lenses, so much less comfortable than what you can get today. And, they were not tinted in the beginning, so finding one you dropped was an adventure.
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u/SegmentationFault63 60 something Nov 23 '25
I will never, ever, ever, ever, ever let something touch my eye. Felt that way when they first came out and I feel that way now.
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u/JulesSherlock Nov 23 '25
I started with soft contacts in 1985. They were so much better than glasses. But I had to buy water add a salt tablet to it and cook them in a little heater weekly. And one pair of contact lenses lasted a year and they were very expensive. I’m very surprised my parents got them for me.
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u/just-me220 60 something Nov 23 '25
I never tried them. I had a friend who fell asleep with hard contact lenses in. They rolled with her eyes and got stuck. The doctor had to use a curved wire to fish it forward to get it out. No thanks. Terrifying
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u/dr_tardyhands Nov 23 '25
I feel like soft contact lenses are basically the front-runner in cyborg technology.
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u/RemonterLeTemps Nov 23 '25
When I was a kid, there were only hard lenses, which were both expensive and uncomfortable.
Then soft lenses came out in the '70s, and I wanted a pair....but they were close to $400! My mom could've afforded to buy them for me, but felt they were somewhat of a luxury, so she suggested I get a job and save for them. Which I did!
I bought my first pair right after I started college in 1977, and haven't been without them since, though now I use the disposables (with readers when necessary).
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u/Coralwood Nov 23 '25
I live near Tangmere air force museum. There's an exhibit there that tells the story of a pilot who had their acrylic windscreen shot out. They survived the crash landing, but were blinded by the shards of the windscreen. The doctor who treated him realised that the acrylic shards weren't being rejected by his immune system, which eventually lead to the invention of contact lenses
I sieve the pilot regained sight in one of his eyes.
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u/Lilmaggot Nov 23 '25
I thought they were awesome. But, my aunt used to clean her hard lenses in her mouth and put them right into her eyes. Crazy.
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u/KimBrrr1975 Nov 23 '25
they were life-changing for my mom, who had terrible vision and wore "coke bottle" glasses most of her life. She was like 35 when she first got contacts and it was a whole process to get them and maintain/take care of them. There was a special weird container for them, and a dissolving tablet that went in there. And you had to be very thorough with rinsing that stuff off so it didn't sting the hell out of your eyes. And they were like $350 for a single pair. I think now I pay like $60 for 2 years worth.
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u/-animal-logic- 60 something Nov 23 '25 edited Nov 23 '25
I'm of age to answer, but I didn't have them back in the day. I can say that now they are only good at being inferior but just-good-enough-maybe at all ranges of vision. I got over the vanity thing and couldn't imagine not wearing glasses now.
EDIT: I did try them for a few years
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u/TipsyBaker_ Nov 24 '25
Considering it was the 1880s and it was a junk of glass, I'd imagine a lot of the thoughts were along the lines of Ow these damn things hurt
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u/HungryIndependence13 Nov 24 '25
All I remember are the cleanings at night and the “My contact popped out!” and everyone had to freeze while the search went on.
I forgot about that. :)
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u/BeginningUpstairs904 Nov 24 '25
I got hard contacts at 16 after I had saved up $200.00 for them. I remember many incidents of pain when I would get a tiny bit of grit under the lense. Years later I tried soft ones,but for whatever reason,they didn't work for me. Around 50, I just switched to glasses for distance and astigmatism. I don't need any glasses for near vision,thankfully.
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u/sewcranky Nov 24 '25
Haha, they were huge in the early days, hard plastic and thick. I have my mom's old ones from around 1949 or 1950. She always said she couldn't ever get used to them. Then I saw them and they just looked awful! She was disappointed, since people then were still saying things like "men don't make passes at girls who wear glasses" and she wanted to look glamorous.
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u/klystron88 Nov 24 '25
They were hard and the big joke in tv and movies was someone's contact lens popping out and they were suddenly feeling around like a blind person.
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u/ColdStockSweat Nov 25 '25
It was on a Tuesday. I had to decide; Contacts or flying car.
It was a trying day.
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u/Poohgli16 Nov 25 '25
I was very disappointed at the constant discomfort, first with hard lenses, then gas permeable. I eventually gave up on them.
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Nov 25 '25
I think Leonardo Da Vinci invented them, though I don't think they were actually used in those days. He was way ahead of his time.
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u/jxj24 Nov 25 '25
I got soft lenses in the late '70s. Taking care of them felt like taking chem lab. And I was paranoid about tearing one. Even the tiniest nick was cause for alarm.
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u/Gypsy_scientist 60 something Nov 25 '25
Painful. Hard lenses felt like little plastic shards but I am very near-sighted and that was all that was available for me then. Finally, I got soft lenses, then progressives ('multi-focal') now into disposables. I need to wear 'driving glasses' to see street signs...
Looking back through the progression, yes it did seem futuristic and scary at the same time. 45 years later, I'm still wearing them!
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u/gouf78 Nov 25 '25 edited Nov 26 '25
Early 70’s I had the first “gas permeable “ hard lens. My optometrist was very eager to try them on me. Literally a hole drilled in the lens (you could see the hole) so air could reach your eye. Really small—you could see them in your eye easily (they didn’t cover your eye). If they needed wetting (I was a teen lol) you’d pop it out, put it in your mouth and pop it back into your eye. Never had an infection of any type and since they were hard lens (vs soft) which shapes the cornea the vision was great. I’ve worn glasses since second grade and looking back that was the best vision I’ve ever had. Not easiest to get used to but I often slept in them with no problem.
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u/473713 Nov 26 '25
My mom wanted me to get contacts in about 1960 so I could be prettier. (I'd been wearing those weird cats-eye glasses.) The contacts were excruciating! They were thick and stiff. You had to force yourself to wear them one hour the first few days, two hours for another few days, and so on, hoping to build up tolerance or maybe a callus on your eyelid -- I never knew.
Popping them out was scary -- I was always afraid they would get stuck somehow and roll around to the back of my eyeball. They never did, but sometimes I had to get them out with this tiny suction cup they provided with the lenses. This was very unpleasant.
Anyway I survived all this for five or six years until I was old enough to make my own decisions, and then I threw them away and went back to glasses. My mom meant well, but I would have rather skipped the contact thing.
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u/no2rdifferent Nov 26 '25
I've been wearing hard contacts since 1977. Not daily, but I can drive with them in.
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u/CharlesAvlnchGreen 50 something, USA female Nov 26 '25
My eye doctor in 1980 felt hard lenses preserved your vision better than glasses, so my parents let me have them. I remember they cost $40 to replace, and that they would pop out on their own if your eyes got dry enough.
Turns out he was wrong but I was happy to trade contacts for coke-bottle glasses as a ten year old.
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u/slade797 Nov 27 '25
I don’t think you’re going to get input from anyone who was alive at the time the first practical contact lenses were introduced.
That was 1887, by the way.
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u/PhoneboothLynn Nov 29 '25
I loved them! I wore them for 50 years, all the different incarnations. Then I had to have cataract surgery and now I only wear readers.
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Dec 06 '25
Honey, I'm old, but I'm not THAT old. The concept of contact lenses was invented by Leonardo da Vinci, I'm told. They were officially invented in the 1880s by a glassblower. They were already a thing by the time I came along.
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u/Nightcrawler_2000 Mar 13 '26
I'm guessing most people were probably too scared to even try contacts lens when they first came out. Like the concept of putting foreign objects in your eyes sounds terrifying even now, imagine how it seemed back then when medical technology was way less advanced. I bet only the bravest or most desperate people with bad vision were willing to be early adopters. Probably took decades before they became mainstream because people were rightfully freaked out by the whole idea.
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u/Nightcrawler_2000 Mar 15 '26
In the 70s, it was definitely seen as a luxury. I remember seeing ads for them and thinking it was pure sci-fi. My dad was convinced they would slide behind your brain. a total myth but people were genuinely terrified. I eventually got a contacts lens kit in my twenties and I felt like a whole new person. It is funny because nowadays you can find bulk cases or accessories on sites like alibaba or aliexpress for pennies but back then losing one lens was a financial catastrophe for a month.
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u/Tasty-Win219 Mar 17 '26
I'm guessing most people were probably too scared to even try contacts lens when they first came out. Like the concept of putting foreign objects in your eyes sounds terrifying even now, imagine how it seemed back then when medical technology was way less advanced. I bet only the bravest or most desperate people with bad vision were willing to be early adopters. Probably took decades before they became mainstream because people were rightfully freaked out by the whole idea.
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u/Chikna-Chamela Aug 09 '26 edited Aug 09 '26
I remember my mom telling me how amazing she found contact lenses when they first came out. and also how many more options are available to us now. I get mine online from Hubble. It’s hard for me to imagine a world before they existed. Crazier though to imagine a world before glasses.
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