The morning started like any other morning. I dropped my bag off at my desk, booted up my computer in order to let it begin its ten-minute warm-up, stowed my bag lunch in the office fridge, and checked over my to-do list for the day.

Once the computer woke up and decided it was going to work, I started responding to emails and working on compiling research for my various projects. 30 minutes into my workday, it hits me: dizziness, tension in my sinuses, pressure behind my eyes. It became hard to focus on the computer screen that I am typing on, let alone anything else. Any work that was once enjoyable becomes painstaking and nauseating.

The culprit? It’s not the head-spinning stack of paperwork that I need to organize, alphabetize, and file before the day is out, and it’s not the lady in the cubicle next to mine who just so happens to be having a very loud venting session with her coworker about a client. No, it’s the fluorescents, above and all around me in my company’s office space. Yes, that’s right, the lighting in the office I work in is affecting my physical health on a daily basis—not in a good way either—and if you work in an office lit my mostly fluorescent, you may also be experiencing health effects.

By now, you’ve probably heard that sitting for more than 75% of your day—more than six hours out of an eight hour workday—increases your chances of developing cardiovascular diseases. However, you probably haven’t heard a lot about the health concerns causes by fluorescent, that is unless you’ve experienced them first hand and gone on a witch hunt for answers (like I did).

Fluorescent are present in most work environments, and can cause physical discomfort and in some severe cases, eye disease. Just like the sun, fluorescent emit ultraviolet (UV) radiation which, as we know, can lead to some forms of cancers after prolonged exposure. Don’t freak out, it’s highly unlikely that fluorescents will give you cancer, but there is a very real possibility that they may cause you to experience dizziness, eyestrain, and headaches.

Eyestrain and head pain aren’t the only effects of exposure to fluorescents, either. Fluorescent lights can play a huge part in your energy levels and sleeping habits, especially if you spend the majority of your day working in an office surrounded by them. According to a study done by Mirjam Muench, found that workers who had more exposure to sunlight throughout the day had more energy to power through their evening work, while workers who had little to no exposure to sunlight were far more tired. 3 p.m. slump, anyone? Could be the lighting.

Because fluorescent lights are also “blue light”—as opposed to white light, or yellow light, both of which are typically warmer and more “natural”—it can also affect your circadian rhythm if you are exposed to it leading up to the time you go to bed, and that can screw with a whole lot of things. Having your circadian rhythm and melatonin production disrupted can influence your hormone balance, stress management, mood, weight, and immunity.

The big question is: what can you do about it? It’s not like you can just march down to your boss’s office and demand that they switch out all the fluorescents for warm/yellow LEDs or better full spectrum fluorescents. I mean, you can do that, and maybe that would work—it really depends on who your boss is—but what can you do specifically to start alleviating the effects of fluorescent lighting now? Here are a few suggestions:

• If you can, apply full spectrum light filters or lenses over the fluorescent bulbs to make the light more warm and natural and reduce the odds of experiencing eye strain.
• Talk to your doctor about being prescribed a pair of glasses with a slight rose tint to cancel out the effects of fluorescent lighting (or buy yourself a pair of light rose colored sunglasses. Sure, your coworkers might look at you strange, but you’ll feel much better).
• Try to get as much exposure to sunlight as possible. Go outside on your lunch break, open your shades if you’re near a window, just do whatever you can to incorporate a little more natural light into you day.

Fluorescent lighting is not the best type of lighting for office spaces and learning environments, and with LEDs rapidly coming down in price and improving in quality, it won’t be long before there will be affordable alternatives to the toxic “blue light” of fluorescents. Until that time arrives, try and catch some rays (of sun) when you can, and consider investing a pair of rose colored glasses, they’re for more than just optimism these days.