A poor night’s sleep might leave you feeling like your eyelids have filled with lead—and keeping them open is the ultimate dead lift. But for some, bad sleep brings on eyelids so droopy and floppy that they can do curl ups on their own.
That was the unfortunate case for a 39-year-old woman who sought care at an ophthalmology clinic in Brooklyn, New York. She told the doctors that for six weeks she felt like she had something in her eyes, and they were watery. By the time of her appointment, her eyelids had rolled up, flipping inside-out on their own—and were staying that way. In the latest issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, doctors report her eye-opening case—and its unexpected solution.
(You can see images of her eyelids—flipped and recovered—here. The images may seem graphic to some, but they are not much worse than that kid in elementary school who would flip their eyelids just to freak everyone out for laughs. You know the one.)
In an initial exam, the doctors noted that her eyes were also bloodshot and that she was unable to fully close them. When the doctors gently tried to manually pull her eyelids upward, they were remarkably limp and curled up more.
The doctors also considered another problem the woman spoke of: She had trouble sleeping. She reported snoring at night and being tired during the day. Her eye symptoms were at their worst when she first woke up. They also noted that she had obesity.
Altogether, the doctors not only had their diagnosis, but they also had the likely culprit. The woman had floppy eyelid syndrome, which is basically exactly what it sounds like. But, despite the straightforward name, it offers a clear explanation; the condition is strongly associated with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), which is also a condition more likely to affect people with excess weight.