Strange behavior with ActiveDocument.Paragraphs.Range

NOt an expert on VBA, but I am trying to do something very easy. I am trying to remove leading spaces from every paragraph in a Word doc.

Here is my VBA code:

Function RemoveLeadingSpaces()
    Dim apara As Paragraph

    Application.ScreenUpdating = False
    For Each apara In ActiveDocument.Paragraphs

        'apara.Range.Text = Trim(apara.Range.Text)
        Debug.Print apara.Range.Text

    Next apara
    Application.ScreenUpdating = True
End Function

The moment I uncomment the line that replaces the text I start getting some strange behavior. The loop becomes infinite and it only applies/replaces the first item/paragraph over and over. If I comment, then the debug prints all paragraphs as it should.

What am I doing wrong?

By adding two debugging lines, you can observe that line 5 (overwriting paragraph break) not only modifies the loop variable apara but also the Paragraph collection. On the next loop iteration, the updated first paragraph is selected again, creating an endless loop.

Function RemoveLeadingSpaces()
    Dim apara As Paragraph
    For Each apara In ActiveDocument.Paragraphs
        apara.Range.Select ' the 1st paragraph is selected
        apara.Range.Text = Trim(apara.Range.Text)
        apara.Range.Select ' the 2nd paragraph is selected
        Debug.Print apara.Range.Text
    Next apara
End Function

Please try to remove leading spaces without affecting paragraph breaks.

btw, If the function doesn’t return a value, you can use a Sub procedure instead of a Function.

Sub DemoRemoveLeadingSpaces()
    Dim apara As Paragraph, rngPara As Range
    Application.ScreenUpdating = False
    For Each apara In ActiveDocument.Paragraphs
        Set rngPara = apara.Range.Duplicate
        rngPara.MoveEnd wdCharacter, -1
        rngPara.Text = Trim(rngPara.Text)
        Debug.Print apara.Range.Text
    Next apara
    Application.ScreenUpdating = True
End Sub