A Very Good - But Not Perfect - IOP Day

Today, I intended to do all the things I did on 8-Nov to keep my IOP low, including working out twice and managing my stress. Unfortunately, I didn't do those things quite as well today. I spent part of the morning researching some regulations that could cause a problem to a new business venture I'm involved in. Doing this research wasn't much fun and I found myself getting a little frustrated. My IOP didn't get too high, but I suspect it was higher than what it would have been if I had lot let myself get frustrated or anxious over the potential regulatory issue. (I was already envisioning lawsuits and other negative things, and we aren't even in business yet!)

In the afternoon I took a break and played with my dog and worked out for about 10m with weights. Previously, on 8-Nov, I had one of the lowest overall IOP values for any day I recall. I also had a very low IOP value after the 9 PM workout (11 in each eye). I did not expect to see similar values today. However, after the workout, I again saw values of about 11 in each eye. What that tells me is that I could have achieved an overall IOP average for today very similar to 8-Nov if I had managed my stress and my activities the same way.

Instead, today's overall IOP averages were:

Left 14.2; Right 15.3 (differential 1.1)

Those are good numbers. They are close to the excellent numbers of 8-Nov. I'm happy with that result. I am particularly interested in the differential. It did not increase over yesterday, even though it has been 5 days since I used Timoptic in my right eye. Is it possible that the effect of Timoptic gel forming solution can last that long? It sure seems like that's the case. Without using Timoptic every few days in my right eye, the pressure is usually a good bit higher than my left eye.

As good as today's numbers are, I know they could have been even better. From 5 PM to 7 PM I was working at the computer and I was disagreeing with an associate in an online conversation. I even noticed that my palms were slightly moist and my hands were cold, which indicates that I was feeling some stress from the disagreement. On 8-Nov, I quickly managed these situations each time I noticed any stress. Today, I stayed engaged. Maybe I did this because I had a couple of lower productivity days this week, and since it is Friday, I felt some pressure to finish things. The stress or anxiety in the 5 PM to 7 PM period was minor. No one got really upset. But I am paying a lot of attention to even subtle indications of stress and I could feel the changes in the skin temperature and skin moisture in my hands. My IOP also increased all the way to 17 from a low of 11 just before 5 PM. Given my experiences on 8-Nov, I think it would have been possible to maintain my IOP at 15 or less by managing my stress better.

There is one other trend in the data I want to comment on. I can't explain it, but I see it fairly consistently. My wife and I went to watch the movie Borat at 7:30 PM, then we went to Starbucks (I didn't drink any caffeine). My IOP was near the high of the day after this relaxing time. Why? I have no idea. But I have seen this trend before. A few months back I noticed that my IOP was higher after watching an action movie. The next few times I watched movies, I watched comedies. However, I noticed the same trend of higher IOP. At the moment, I have no theory about what is going on. But whatever it is, the trend is consistent.

Finally, there were several times today (as in prior days) where I repeated an IOP measurement while trying to relax. Sometimes it seems like I can lower my IOP by relaxing and breathing for a couple minutes and then repeating the measurement. Other times, my IOP actually goes up slightly. This variation may be meaningless because it is probably within the range of error for the measurements. However, I plan to keep testing for any relaxation effect and see if we find anything of significance with more data. I mention it only because you will see the repeated tests in the data for today and other days.

With all this talk about stress, I do need to make sure it is clear - this was a low stress day!