The hard part is not the technique, it is your blink reflex. Everyone’s eye fights back at first. It stops within a few days, and the people who give up almost always give up in week one rather than because lenses do not suit them.
Before you touch your eye
- Wash your hands with plain soap — nothing moisturising or perfumed — and dry on a lint-free towel
- Trim your nails, or at least work with the pads of your fingers only
- Plug the sink. Everyone loses one down the drain eventually
- Always start with the same eye. It is the simplest way never to mix up two different prescriptions
Check the lens first
Two seconds, and it prevents most bad experiences.
Is it the right way round? Sit it on your fingertip and look at it edge on. Correct: the edges rise straight up like a bowl. Inside out: they flare outward slightly. An inverted lens is uncomfortable and slightly blurry rather than painful — see blurry contacts.
Is it intact? Hold it up to the light and look for nicks in the edge. A torn lens goes in feeling like grit — see a torn lens.
The method
- Balance the lens on the tip of your index finger, bowl upward. If it is sitting in a puddle of solution it will cling to your finger instead of your eye — shake most of it off.
- Hold the upper lid open with your other hand, fingers on the lashes, pressing up against the brow bone. Hold it firmly: this is what stops the blink.
- Pull the lower lid down with the middle finger of the inserting hand.
- Look up, or straight ahead — try both, people differ. Looking slightly up and placing the lens on the white below the iris is easier for many beginners than going straight at the cornea.
- Bring the lens in slowly and touch it to the eye. It transfers on contact because your eye is wetter than your finger.
- Look down, then release the lids slowly. Do not squeeze shut — that pushes the lens out.
- Blink gently a few times to centre it.
If it will not go in
- The lens sticks to your finger — your finger is too wet. Dry it and try again.
- You keep blinking — you are not holding the upper lid firmly enough. Get right onto the lash roots.
- The lens folds — you are approaching too fast, or it is too dry. Rinse and slow down.
- It will not stay centred — close the eye and massage gently through the lid towards the middle.
- You are getting frustrated — stop, rinse the lens, and take a break. Tension makes the reflex worse, and twenty minutes on the first day is normal.
What it should feel like
Aware of it for a moment, then nothing. Mild awareness for a few days as a new wearer is normal.
Not normal: sharp pain, persistent grittiness, stinging, or redness. Take it out and look for a tear, debris, or an inverted lens. If it still hurts with the lens out, that needs attention — see red eye with contacts.
Stinging on insertion, every time, usually means a reaction to your solution — see solutions compared.
If you wear rigid or scleral lenses
A rigid lens goes on with a drop of conditioning solution and is placed directly on the cornea, usually looking straight into a mirror flat on a table.
A scleral lens is filled to the brim with preservative-free saline first and inserted while looking straight down, face parallel to the floor, so the fluid does not escape. A bubble means starting again — it will blur vision and dry that patch of cornea.
The first week
Build up wearing time as instructed rather than going straight to fourteen hours. Keep your glasses current for the evenings. And never sleep in lenses unless they were prescribed for it — see sleeping in contacts.
Then taking them out, which most people find easier.
General information, not a substitute for instruction from your own optometrist. Reviewed by Dr. Teresita Bollar, OD.
