I Wore Blue Light Glasses for a Month and Here’s What Happened

You’ve probably seen them. All those ads for blue light blocking glasses; advertisers telling you you’re looking at a screen too many hours a day.

I saw the ads, too. For months.

And I ignored them.

Here’s the truth - I’ve wanted glasses since elementary school but I’ve been cursed with perfect vision (insert non-sympathetic eye roll here), so I’ve never had a good enough excuse to buy them.

Finally, at the nudging of a few friends at work, I was talked into ordering a pair. At least they weren’t straight vanity glasses and they’d actually serve a purpose. Two birds, one stone.

Increasing sleep quality and decreasing headaches weren’t even on my mind when I ordered them.

I’d heard that the blue light emitted from the screens we stare at for hours a day feed our brains too much of a chemical that yells, “STAY AWAKE,” but I had no idea how much it was actually affecting me.

I feel like I should say that I will make a total of exactly ZERO dollars by sharing this information with you. Amazon doesn’t care about my blog. I just have to share because it made such a drastic difference beginning with the first night I wore them.

You can purchase your own pair of blue light blocking glasses at THIS LINK. And surprise - you get two pairs!

Also, be sure to check out the bottom of this post where you can find a link to order the t-shirt I recently designed! T-shirts and sweaters can be purchased until September 14th!

SLEEP QUALITY

LEFT-BEFORE; RIGHT-AFTER

First thing’s first: My sleep quality increased from averaging around 50-60% to 91% the first week of wearing them. YES. 30% increase in sleep quality. What?!?!?

Some people choose to only wear blue light glasses when they’re looking at a screen, but I choose to wear them all day long because I don’t like how glasses rub foundation off of my face. So, I’m not sure how much that has impacted my sleep quality and if it’d be the same or different if I didn’t wear them all day.

The reason my most recent data points go up/down is because there have been a few days I’ve either chosen not to wear the glasses or I forgot to put them on. Also, I noticed right away that on the days I chose not to wear the glasses, it was pretty much guaranteed that my sleep graph was going to average around 60%.

As you can see in these images, my sleep quality hovered around 60% between May-July. June and July’s calendars are not complete because I was sleeping so poorly that I didn’t even bother to track on the app most nights. As you can see in the August calendar, I began wearing the glasses on Aug. 6th and it is super evident which days I did/didn’t wear my blue light glasses.

The sleep app I use, Sleep Cycle, has some other (fun!) graphs that I thought I’d share on this post. #nerdalert. I’ve been using the app off and on for almost 9 years now, so I have some pretty strong data to bring to my doctor if we ever needed to look at trends in my sleep quality.

While the blue light glasses have had a HUGE impact on my sleep quality, it should also be said that it’s obviously not the only reason I’ve seen an increase lately.

A few other factors that have helped me sleep better and wake up feeling GREAT:

Getting in bed on time (9pm)
Reading before bed - an actual book; NOT on a screen
No screens 30 mins. before bed
Going to bed around the same time each night
Being in bed for at least 8 hours/night

All of these things definitely help, but as someone who’s struggled with intermittent insomnia, I can honestly say that I’ve never seen one change make more of an impact on my sleep than these cheap, little glasses. If you struggle with this too, it’s worth a shot!