My mom says I’m too young to have contacts. She thinks they’ll ruin my eyes. Is this true?

Your mom has the final say, but “most kids start wearing them around age 11 or 12,” says optometrist Jonathan Goulart, Northwest Eyecare, Freeport, Ill. “As long as you’re committed to following the care instructions, they are perfectly safe,” he says. True, dirty contacts or ones worn longer than recommended can cause infections and even scratch delicate tissue. Your mom might worry that you’re too young for the responsibility, but a three-year study at Indiana University found that kids ages 11 to 13 handled contacts carefully and understood how important it is to keep them clean.

Everyone, kids especially, needs to see an eye care professional to be fitted. Web sites offer contacts, and some drug stores even sell them. Stay away from these. Ill-fitting lenses can scrape corneas, while the wrong prescription can make your head hurt. Want color-changing or wacky-pattern contacts? Those are cool as long as you get them from a reputable center.

More good news is that stories about contacts getting “lost” in your peepers are purely myth. Plus, the prices keep getting cheaper—glasses and contacts now cost about the same. Maybe that’ll have Mom seeing things your way.