{"id":109521,"date":"2025-09-02T16:29:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-02T16:29:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/109521\/"},"modified":"2025-09-02T16:29:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-02T16:29:11","slug":"i-thought-my-eye-pain-was-from-too-much-screen-time-it-was-the-first-sign-of-a-harrowing-disease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/109521\/","title":{"rendered":"I thought my eye pain was from too much screen time… it was the first sign of a harrowing disease"},"content":{"rendered":"

A woman who thought her eye pain was from too much screen time has revealed how she discovered that it was actually the first sign that she was battling a harrowing disease.<\/p>\n

Amanda Hahn, 29, from New York, said there were little clues for years that something was wrong with her – including memory problems and random bouts of numbness – but she ‘brushed them off.’<\/p>\n

The first big symptom that ‘made her pause’ was a ‘sharp pain in her eye’ whenever she ‘looked down and to the side.’<\/p>\n

Still, it didn’t occur to her that it was something serious.<\/p>\n

‘At first, I blamed it on my job. I work in digital marketing at an agency, so I’m glued to a computer screen all day,’ she explained during an exclusive chat with the Daily Mail.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘When I am not glued to my computer screen, I am on my phone. It felt natural to assume it was just eye strain.<\/p>\n

‘I’ve always been the type to brush off little health things like, “Oh, it’s nothing.” So the idea that it could be something serious didn’t even cross my mind.’<\/p>\n

But when her vision ‘started to change’ in 2019, she finally decided it was time to go to the doctor.<\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

A woman who thought her eye pain was from too much screen time has revealed how she discovered that it was actually the first sign that she was battling a harrowing disease<\/p>\n

\"Amanda <\/p>\n

Amanda Hahn, 29, from New York, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) in 2019<\/p>\n

‘Things looked blurry, colors seemed off, and my eye just didn’t feel right,’ she explained.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘I knew it wasn’t just screen fatigue anymore. That’s when I went to the eye doctor – and everything escalated quickly from there.’<\/p>\n

After examining her, the eye doctor suggested she go to the ER for an MRI, and she soon learned that she was battling\u00a0multiple sclerosis (MS).<\/p>\n

‘I was completely in shock. My parents were out of the country at the time, and I had spent the entire day in the ER waiting for my MRI and the results,’ she recalled.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘When a nurse finally came in, she just handed me a pamphlet and said, “This is what your life will look like in 10 years.”<\/p>\n

‘Honestly, I didn’t even believe her at first. My mom also has MS, so I was confused… how could this really be happening to me too?<\/p>\n

‘I ended up going to several other doctors just to confirm the diagnosis.’<\/p>\n

MS is\u00a0a chronic autoimmune disease that affects the brain, spinal cord, and optic nerves.<\/p>\n

\"She\u00a0said <\/p>\n

She\u00a0said there were little clues for years that something was wrong with her – including memory problems and random bouts of numbness – but she ‘brushed them off’<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

The first big symptom that ‘made her pause’ was a ‘sharp pain in her eye’ whenever she ‘looked down and to the side’<\/p>\n

\"She <\/p>\n

She said,\u00a0‘When I am not glued to my computer screen, I am on my phone. It felt natural to assume it was just eye strain’<\/p>\n

‘In MS, the immune system attacks the protective sheath that covers nerve fibers, known as myelin,’ Mayo Clinic<\/a> previously explained.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘This interrupts communication between the brain and the rest of the body.’<\/p>\n

Flash forward to now, six years later, and Amanda has learned to live with the disease.<\/p>\n

‘[Every day] I remind myself that MS is part of my life, but it doesn’t define my life,’ she explained.<\/p>\n

‘There are hard days, of course, but I focus on what I can do and what makes me feel good, like staying active, connecting with others, and sharing my story.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘MS has also taught me that life can change at any moment, so you can’t let anything hold you back.<\/p>\n

‘You have to live your life fully and do the things that make you happy. That mindset helps me stay grounded and positive.’<\/p>\n

While she admitted that she was ‘not very healthy’ before her diagnosis – ‘late nights, bad food choices, and not much activity’ during college – she said the diagnosis ‘completely changed how she approaches her health.’<\/p>\n

\"Flash <\/p>\n

Flash forward to now, six years later, and Amanda has learned to live with the disease\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"'[Every <\/p>\n

‘[Every day] I remind myself that MS is part of my life, but it doesn’t define my life,’ she explained<\/p>\n

\"She <\/p>\n

She often documents her journey with MS on social media, where she said she’s received a slew of positive messages<\/p>\n

‘I try to walk every day, eat fewer processed foods, and stick to a low-carb lifestyle. I also do my best not to stress over things, especially the things I can’t control,’ she shared.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘I’ve cut toxic people out of my life, and I try to focus my energy on what really matters.<\/p>\n

‘I’ve learned that my health has to come first. Thankfully, with treatment and lifestyle changes, I’m doing really well right now.’\u00a0<\/p>\n

She often documents her journey with MS on social media, where she said she’s received a slew of positive messages from people who have told her it helped them ‘feel less alone.’\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘That encouragement [gives] me the push to keep going,’ she gushed.<\/p>\n

In the end, she hopes that people use her story as a reminder that ‘different’ can still be ‘beautiful.’<\/p>\n

‘MS doesn’t mean your life is over, it just means life might look a little different,’ she concluded.<\/p>\n

‘Different isn’t bad. It can still be really beautiful. I want people to know it’s okay to be scared, but it’s also possible to keep living a full and happy life.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘Most of all, I hope we can break the stigma that having a disease means you can’t live a ‘normal’ life. You can – you just create your own version of normal.’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A woman who thought her eye pain was from too much screen time has revealed how she discovered…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109522,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[97,519,59,102,394,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-109521","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-dailymail","9":"tag-femail","10":"tag-gb","11":"tag-health","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom","15":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109521"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109521\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}