You begin walking and within minutes notice that you have blurry vision, or vision that is more blurred than usual.
What is the cause of this worrisome response to walking?
First off, make sure that it’s really happening—that soon after you are engaged in sustained walking, your eyesight is actually more blurry.
As you begin walking outdoors somewhere or along a corridor inside a building, things in the distance will come into view, such as signs.
Reading or trying to read these signs will heighten awareness of your vision and may create the illusion that walking leads to blurred vision.
However, this observation may be based on something really happening with your eyes, for which walking plays a contributing role.
“It could be from low blood pressure or low blood sugar,” says Dr. Brian Boxer Wachler, MD, eye surgeon and founder of The Boxer Wachler Vision Institute, and developer of the Holcomb C3-R® procedure which treats a degenerative eye disease.
“This typically appears like the vision slowly begins to ‘gray out and get darker,” adds Dr. Boxer Wachler.
The issue with low blood pressure is that usually there will be a faint feeling accompanied by it, or some kind of rushing feeling in the head.
The effect is temporary as your blood pressure rises back to normal. To prevent this problem, rise from your chair gradually to give your cardiovascular system time to adjust more smoothly to the change in position.
What works very well is rising to a midway position and holding for 15 seconds, then rising a little bit more for 10 seconds, then standing for a few moments before walking.
As for low blood sugar, take note if instances of blurry vision minutes after walking tend to occur when you haven’t eaten for quite a while.
If you can’t see a relationship between lack of nourishment and the vision issue, and slowly rising from a seated position doesn’t alleviate the problem, then it’ll be smart to see a doctor.
“Being dehydrated could be another cause,” says Dr. Boxer Wachler. “An uncommon cause would be multiple sclerosis.”
Dr. Boxer Wachler has delivered hundreds of lectures on eye surgery to thousands of eye surgeons from around the world, and is a pioneer in keratoconus treatment.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
Blurry Vision After Walking a Few Minutes
