Sudden onset of eye floaters

[Erik1971]

Hi,

Over the past few years, I’ve experienced many different TMS symptoms, ranging from body-wide muscle twitching to tinnitus, sleep problems, and urinary issues. All of these TMS symptoms eventually went away.

This year, I suddenly developed itchy, dry eyes, followed by pain in my eyes, and then, from one day to the next, I started experiencing floaters in both eyes.

I was examined by an optometrist, who diagnosed a posterior vitreous detachment in my right eye. Apparently, this can happen earlier in people who are highly myopic, although eventually everyone experiences it because it is part of the aging process.

Still, I keep wondering whether this could also be TMS. It happened after a stressful period at work, as well as problems and stress in my personal life, and then suddenly I developed this symptom.

Because this is a new symptom involving my vision, I’ve once again found myself caught in a vicious cycle of hyperfocusing on the symptoms, which in turn creates more fear and stress.

I also find it strange that I suddenly have floaters in both eyes, while the partial vitreous detachment was only found in my right eye.

Has anyone here had a similar experience? Should I just view this as another TMS symptom and approach it in the same way?


Thanks in advance for your advice and support.

 

[BloodMoon]

Hi @Erik1971. It’s incredibly common to get floaters without a PVD, especially if you’re nearsighted. Longer eyeballs stretch the vitreous gel, so the collagen fibers break down and clump earlier in life—often in the 20s or 30s—well before any PVD. Some people are even born with tiny floaters or have had them since childhood, so they’ve literally been there as long as they can see. Your PVD and dry eye pain probably just acted as a big alarm bell. Because you were already stressed, your nervous system went into high alert and stopped filtering out visual “noise”. The debris was likely there all along; your brain just suddenly started paying attention to it.

Since your optometrist has confirmed your retina is safe (no tears, detachment, or bleeding), it can be helpful to treat your reaction to the floaters as mind-body/TMS. The shadows are physical, but the hyper‑focus and fear are neural circuit processing.

I’m in my 60s and my vitreous is full of floaters in both eyes, but most of the time I don’t notice them because my brain has learned to filter them out. That’s a sign that adaptation is possible—and in fact it’s quite usual once you adopt a policy of paying no heed to them.

When a floater pops up you can just note “harmless floater” and then gently return your attention to what you were doing. It could also help to stop tracking them or testing your vision against white walls and bright screens (which is something I used to do when I first got floaters but eventually realised that was unhelpful). Over time, as the fear drops, your brain can neuro‑adapt again and filter them out more. Of course, if you ever get a sudden shower of new floaters, flashes of light, or a curtain/shadow in your vision, that’s the time to get checked out urgently.

Hope this helps.

 

[Cactusflower]

Hi @Erik1971
This happened to me 2 years ago. At first I thought it was TMS, but something told me to head to an ophthalmologist.
The floaters happened, but he was clear, my brain would learn to bipass them over time. He even mentioned “neural pathways”
He was right! 99% of the time I don’t see them. Occasionally in certain light I do. No worries because I know they are normal.

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

I also find it strange that I suddenly have floaters in both eyes, while the partial vitreous detachment was only found in my right eye.

That's a very good thing to note! Obviously those above know way more about this symptom than me, but assuming that the PVD doesn't need medical treatment (a quick search of this told me that oftentimes it doesn't), then as long as your optometrist is comfortable with where things are at with your eyes then I think you're safe to treat it as TMS