8 Things you should definitely not do whilst wearing specs

When you first become a glasses wearer, you’re blissfully unaware that as well as signing up to rent your vision, you’re also signing away the right to do many things that were once simple and pleasurable.

Your optometrist doesn’t tell you this, and it’s not like it’s all laid out somewhere in the small print. They’re simply something you have to discover and suffer through yourself.

Commiserations if you recognise any of these small but incredibly frustrating complications of glasses on our list below. If you don’t, well, count yourself lucky — you can learn from the rest of us and skip straight to the smarter solution.

1. Take a shower

Are you really going to take off your glasses, climb into an already slippy porcelain death trap and then run water and lather up?

Better to stick to the tub; if not to maintain your dignity and avoid turning up to work with a limp and a black eye, to actually make sure you get a decent wash.

2. Enjoy a hot beverage

Nothing beats sitting down at the end of a day to melt the stress away with a nice book and a steaming-hot cup of tea or cocoa. But when one sip in and your whole world goes foggy, it only goes toward making the day that little bit more stressful.

3. Have a relaxing nap

It’s one time of the day when you don’t need your eyes. But rather than taking them off and forgetting where they are, you instead wake up half an hour later to find them bent and smushed into the side of your face. Talk about feeling refreshed.

4. Go to the beach

The beach is a love it or hate it kind of place. When you wear glasses, it can swing wildly between the two throughout the whole time you’re there.

With your pricey prescription sunglasses, you can enjoy the sun but only while being constantly on guard. Should anyone happen to come near you or them, you react like an assassin. Going for a swim takes even more vigilance; do you risk losing them or risk losing yourself on the walk back across the beach to your family?

5. Do anything remotely active

Glasses are a good excuse not to hit the gym, but the compromise is you can’t even roll around with the dog or jog ten feet to catch the bus without them jumping all over the place. In fact, unless you stay absolutely stationary, without bending over to pick anything up or quickly turning around, then it’s guaranteed they’ll find a way to leave your face.

6. Cook anything

Making Christmas dinner, putting on a Sunday roast, or even steaming rice in the microwave can all be like taking a journey through the depths of the Amazon rainforest. One moment you’re in a kitchen in a familiar town, next you’re in the tropics and can’t see a thing thanks to your fogged up lenses.

7. Put make-up on

You can’t put your make-up on while you’re wearing your glasses, but you also can’t see how you’re doing without them. It’s the classic dilemma that usually ends up with you trying to balance them on your nose or simply doing without and having a few drinks to improve the results.

8. Take a normal photo

Your glasses like to steal the show and get in the way no matter what side of the camera you’re on. They jam up against the lens, attract the glare of the sun, and make you look ten years older than your friends. But it’s either that or taking a picture that chops of everyone’s heads or makes it look like you’re always smiling at someone passing by instead of at the camera.