Styes

[Summer]

I am not sure if I have a stye but I know what they are...anyways, I searched the forum for styes and found that some people have had them. I am just wondering how frequently and if you feel it is from the kava? I have been drinking kava off and mostly on since last summer.

I will admit that I immediately thought it was the kava, until I remembered that on Friday I had put an old pair of contacts in my eyes that I ended up throwing away after a half day of wearing them. So I am feeling like it was the contacts, although I know that sticky eyes and such can be kava related.

So, just looking for any correlation!

 

[Zac Imiola (Herbalist)]

I got a stye recently! lol i thought it was because my immune system is lower recently and i stopped ingesting cannabis... when i smoke bud (which i do at night now only for sleep) it makes it way better, but this is very interesting cause i was thinking that maybe its not the kava but simply the dryness of the eyes which can cause less mucous to fight off infection? Im not really sure, but green tea and warm towel ! on your eye works wonders,,, or dandelion fresh, (great time to get a sty) will help alleviate it..

mines still here but seriously much better after a little cannabacea and matcha on a warm towell

 

[blindy107]

It's from the kava.

Further reading can be found here.

http://www.kavaforums.com/forum/thr...-or-may-not-be-associated-with-kava-use.7185/

 

[verticity]

I have not had styes, but I do sometimes get dry eyes from kava. What helps for me is to take a clean wash cloth, wet it with lukewarm water, and very gently rub my eyelids with it, and also clean out the corners of my eyes, then gently pat dry. This helps degrease and exfoliate my eyes. You can also try Ocusoft, which has a mild detergent like baby shampoo, but if you use Ocusoft, you need to rinse very thoroughly, otherwise the detergent can irritate your eyes.

 

[sɥɐʞɐs]

I drank a lot of kava for years, almost every night and never really had any eye problems.
The last couple weeks though, I stopped drinking kava to clear up some standard dermopathy, but it just kept getting worse. I got my first stye which is likely related to kava dermopathy or the dust cloud I spend hours in at work. Probably both, the problem in knowing for sure is that neither have previously given me this problem and my dermo kicked in right when a new work order started.

The stye, which started out invisible but with a slight pain when I blinked, eventually started show inflammation. It got worse for a couple days and I'd wake up with puffy bags under my eye, the normal under-eye part was puffy and then I had a second puffy bag after that one. They would reduce a bit after after soaking it with a hot rag. The puffy days were more painful and irritated, after that stage the redness started become more focused on a single area, the pain reduced and it was progressively better every day. It also left bruising on my eye afterward. This week I'm lucky enough to have ANOTHER one start up in my other eye, back-to-back.

Taking fish oil and soaking it with a hot water rag a couple times a day seems to help reverse it a little quicker. I've seen many other home remedies that I haven't tried.

Here are some pics of it, when it started getting noticeable. Unfortunately the picture quality turned out to be horrible and it doesn't really convey how prominent it was:

I'm curious if @nabanga can tell us if he found eye styes to be common for the Ni-Vanuatu kava drinkers.
If it's not common among them, perhaps it would suggest that their fish-heavy diet keeps the sebaceous glands oiled properly...or that fresh green kava doesn't cause dermo problems as easily as dry. (which has been said before)

(I'll probably re-post this in the other eye stye thread too)

 

[Zac Imiola (Herbalist)]

I really think it's a matter of dryness preventing proper anti microbial/bacterial etc.
But seriously get some green tea. High quality and put it on your eye .. it works amazing. Lol .. this is crazy we all are getting stys right now specifically tho. It might be in a wierd way something going around or something cause. The kava forums surely would have had this come up before and we are all getting it the same time

 

[nabanga]

I'm curious if @nabanga can tell us if he found eye styes to be common for the Ni-Vanuatu kava drinkers.
If it's not common among them, perhaps it would suggest that their fish-heavy diet keeps the sebaceous glands oiled properly...or that fresh green kava doesn't cause dermo problems as easily as dry. (which has been said before)

(I'll probably re-post this in the other eye stye thread too)

No, I never came across anyone with a stye in Vanuatu and it definitely isn't known as something caused by kava over there. A lot of men regularly get what they call "red-eye" where the white of the eye turns blood red, but this is just a type of conjunctivitis caused by the large amount of bacteria thriving in the humid heat there.

But from personal observation its definitely true that even excessive daily fresh green kava intake doesn't cause dermo anywhere near as bad as dry kava does. I never had eye problems in Vanuatu, and didn't really have any significant dermo either, even drinking 10+shells on a nightly basis. But now I am on dry kava I get dried out with itchy eyes every couple of months.

 

[VictoryRider]

I have a stye currently. It's called "my daughter's bedroom".

 

[Zac Imiola (Herbalist)]

Yeah I think the dust from the spring and dry eyes can be a huge thing..

 

[2Intense]

I really think it's a matter of dryness preventing proper anti microbial/bacterial etc.
But seriously get some green tea. High quality and put it on your eye .. it works amazing. Lol .. this is crazy we all are getting stys right now specifically tho. It might be in a wierd way something going around or something cause. The kava forums surely would have had this come up before and we are all getting it the same time

This is a great idea, I have actually used Raspberry tea bags as recommended in, Nutritional Healing by Balch. Here's my hack for the "warm compress" idea - I use a microwaveable sinus heat bag and use in combination with a clean moist cloth and the wet tea bag. Against the eye I layer the tea bag, wet cloth and finally the microwave bag. The microwave bag serves as a heat sink and keeps the temp up for 10 minutes otherwise I find a wash cloth is clod in 2 minutes. You must be extremely careful to avoid burning your eye lid!!

 

[Summer]

Thanks for all of the responses! I am happy that it never fully developed into a stye and is almost gone now. I have been disinfecting my eye and washing with warm water, plus I took two days off from kava. I drank extra water. It all helped. I probably need to discipline myself a little more with kava dosage and water intake.

@shakas Were you referring to the stye or the dermo getting worse - did you say you haven't drank any for two weeks?

 

[sɥɐʞɐs]

@shakas Were you referring to the stye or the dermo getting worse - did you say you haven't drank any for two weeks?

Yeah, 2 weeks, typically any dermo I've ever had could be cleared up with a few days off and some AmLactin.
This one though, repeatedly did my typical dermo cycle of making skin flare up and feel kinda sun-burnt and tight when I stretch, then look dry and shed off after that. Then it would feel normal. But instead of staying normal for a while, I'm now on my 6th or 7th straight dermo "flush" in a row.

Both the stye and the dermo get worse before they get better, but today I can definitely say I was able to reverse my 2nd stye before it got as bad as the first one. It's still absolutely ridiculous to have gotten them back to back though. I started drinking kava again last night, If I get another stye, I'm gonna start punching holes in walls.

 

[verticity]

I drank a lot of kava for years, almost every night and never really had any eye problems.
The last couple weeks though, I stopped drinking kava to clear up some standard dermopathy, but it just kept getting worse. I got my first stye which is likely related to kava dermopathy or the dust cloud I spend hours in at work. Probably both, the problem in knowing for sure is that neither have previously given me this problem and my dermo kicked in right when a new work order started.

The stye, which started out invisible but with a slight pain when I blinked, eventually started show inflammation. It got worse for a couple days and I'd wake up with puffy bags under my eye, the normal under-eye part was puffy and then I had a second puffy bag after that one. They would reduce a bit after after soaking it with a hot rag. The puffy days were more painful and irritated, after that stage the redness started become more focused on a single area, the pain reduced and it was progressively better every day. It also left bruising on my eye afterward. This week I'm lucky enough to have ANOTHER one start up in my other eye, back-to-back.

Taking fish oil and soaking it with a hot water rag a couple times a day seems to help reverse it a little quicker. I've seen many other home remedies that I haven't tried.

Here are some pics of it, when it started getting noticeable. Unfortunately the picture quality turned out to be horrible and it doesn't really convey how prominent it was:

View attachment 6097​

I'm curious if @nabanga can tell us if he found eye styes to be common for the Ni-Vanuatu kava drinkers.
If it's not common among them, perhaps it would suggest that their fish-heavy diet keeps the sebaceous glands oiled properly...or that fresh green kava doesn't cause dermo problems as easily as dry. (which has been said before)

(I'll probably re-post this in the other eye stye thread too)

@sɥɐʞɐs - That's a very stye-lish animated GIF there

 

[Jonathan]

This is so weird to hear you guys all have Stys, because I just got two as well!! Sunday one formed in my right eye, and then Monday another one in my left. Both in the upper eyelid. I did the warm towel thing and they're both gone by this morning (Wednesday)... so overall they lasted just a few days.

Kava affecting the mucus levels which in turn would affect the normal anti-microbial function makes sense to me... I don't think kava is directly responsible, per se, but it could be a chain reaction from the dryness...

 

[sɥɐʞɐs]

another update: That second stye, that I had been able to reverse, raged back up for one day a week later.
It left another bruise and a lump under my skin for a week.

Now, a couple weeks back into kava(after a break), my eyes are already feeling itchy/watery and my face skin is already starting to feel like early dermo. This morning I noticed a small stye directly on the rim of my eye lid.
This is looking to be a major hindrance for me, and had previously never been a problem.
Now it appears to be the first thing that happens to me, and with certainty.
Very disappointed.

I got some more fuel for my theory that the Ni-Van diet might help keep the styes away. I read that Sweet Potatoes contain incredibly high amounts of Vitamin A...and that Vitamin A helps with healthy skin, eyes and mucous membrane etc... Sweet Potatoes happen to be a staple of the Vanuatu diet and are ubiquitous there. So, perhaps the frequent consumption of fish (omega-3 oils) and sweet potatoes (Vitamin A) make for the perfect combo to reduce dermo likelihood or severity.

I suppose I'll start buying sweet potatoes now.

 

[Jonathan]

another update: That second stye, that I had been able to reverse, raged back up for one day a week later.
It left another bruise and a lump under my skin for a week.

Now, a couple weeks back into kava(after a break), my eyes are already feeling itchy/watery and my face skin is already starting to feel like early dermo. This morning I noticed a small stye directly on the rim of my eye lid.
This is looking to be a major hindrance for me, and had previously never been a problem.
Now it appears to be the first thing that happens to me, and with certainty.
Very disappointed.

I got some more fuel for my theory that the Ni-Van diet might help keep the styes away. I read that Sweet Potatoes contain incredibly high amounts of Vitamin A...and that Vitamin A helps with healthy skin, eyes and mucous membrane etc... Sweet Potatoes happen to be a staple of the Vanuatu diet and are ubiquitous there. So, perhaps the frequent consumption of fish (omega-3 oils) and sweet potatoes (Vitamin A) make for the perfect combo to reduce dermo likelihood or severity.

I suppose I'll start buying sweet potatoes now.

For what it's worth, I had three recurring styes within a span of two weeks after daily kava consumption. I -really- am not implying that you're a dirty man, but I realized that I was not attending to my face properly when I showered. I started diligently washing my face and eyes every day, and haven't had a recurrence. No offense at all, I just found that to be true for me and figured I'd bring it up.

Just kidding, you're such a dirty hippy shakas. Wash your damn face! Not kidding about the solution though, I haven't had a problem since I started paying more attention to that.

 

[sɥɐʞɐs]

@Jonathan honesty, before the styes I never really considered eye hygiene at all...wasn't even a thought.
But after I got those 1st two, I started paying attention to cleaning my eyes every day, that's why this new stye is so disheartening, it arrived when I started paying the most attention to cleanliness...and I didn't even get more than a month away. Never had a problem in the several years of consumption prior, with no deliberate attention paid to cleaning at all.

 

[Summer]

That's interesting information, because I eat sweet potatoes almost every day. I also eat a lot of wild salmon.

My original post thought I may have had a stye and it turned out to be a small infection from my contact and no problems since. I drink kava almost everyday, but only instants unless I run out. I am curious as to how much water you drink (knowing that kava completely affects everyone differently and so I am not comparing - just curious).

 

[sɥɐʞɐs]

I am curious as to how much water you drink (knowing that kava completely affects everyone differently and so I am not comparing - just curious).

I not sure exactly, but maybe 5 or 6+ cups of actual water. I used to drink more, but I also used to be more active...I also don't want to have to pee at work over and over. I don't ever feel thirsty though and often feel full, or satiated enough that forcing water in my seems unpleasant.