It is possible to sleep with your contact lenses in if you have the right type of lenses to do so.  You will require contact lenses identified as extended wear in order to be able to sleep with your lenses in your eyes without injuring or irritating the eye.  These types of lenses are fantastic if you want to open your eyes first thing in the morning and be able to see the world around you with immediacy!  Contact lenses that cannot be worn to bed while you sleep are called daily wear contacts.  Wearing these to bed can lead to eye irritation, and your lenses being very dry when you wake up in the morning.  This can lead to contacts accidentally falling out.

Extended wear contact lenses are specially crafted; these lenses permit a greater amount of oxygen to reach the cornea in your eye so that you experience less eye irritation while wearing them.  The amount of days that you can actually leave extended wear contacts in your eyes will vary depending upon the type of extended wear contacts you are using.  Some extended wear contacts can be left in for an entire week while others will allow you to keep the lenses in your eye for a month’s time.

The extended wear contacts that can be left in your eyes for a period of thirty days are made up of silicone hydrogel so they are softer than other contact lens offerings.  Alternatively, some manufacturers create contacts that are “gas permeable” and these too can be worn for an entire month without removal.  Extended wear, sometimes identified as continuous wear contacts, have been offered since the early 1980s after they received full approval from the Food and Drug Administration.  The earliest extended wear offerings could be worn between 7 and 14 days, but newer innovations have made it safe and fully possible to wear extended contact lenses for 30 days at a time.  If the lenses become uncomfortable, they can be removed, cleaned, and replaced after a period of leaving them out of the eyes.  Although you can wear these lenses for up to 30 days straight, few people actually do this.  They will usually need to be taken out once a week to be cleaned.  Extended wear lenses are now offered as disposable lenses so they are far more sanitary than they were when they were first offered in the 1980s.  The likelihood of developing eye infections has significantly diminished with their use.

Whether or not you can sleep in your lenses really boils down to how sensitive your eyes are.  No two sets of eyes are the same, and everyone reacts differently to certain things.  If you still aren’t sure, try taking a nap in them.  Or just sleep with them in for a night.  Your eyes will not be permanently damaged or irritated from just one night of sleeping with them in.