I Can See Clearly Now

Last summer, shortly after Lily's 3 year old well visit to the pediatrician, we started noticing Lily's left eye turning in a  bit when she was tired, so we headed back to the doctor where I mentioned what we had seen. { love her!}  She checked her eyes and saw what we were talking about and recommended we see a pediatric opthalmologist reassuring us that it doesn't have to mean worst case scenario.  We immediately called to make the appointment, but still were unable to get in for a few weeks.  Of course between the pediatrician visit and the opthalmologist visit, I broke my ankle, Andrew broke his wrist, and of course I was still in my 31+ weeks of pregnancy.

Lily's eye actually began turning more frequently and more significantly, but again, mostly when she was tired. The thing is, it's tricky to tell really because kids do weird things with their eyes and when it's slight, you're not entirely sure you actually see it or if it's just a quick focusing thing. 

This picture (2 days before her appointment), she had just woken up. Her left, your right.

The day of her appointment, George and I were both pretty nervous. The possibility of having something wrong with our baby's vision was pretty scary.   There were a lot of trucks and blocks to play with in the waiting area and when it came time to go back to an examination room, Lily didn't want to give up the truck, so the truck came too.   In the first part of the exam, Lily had to cover each eye and name the black and white object on a card as they moved further and further away.

This was reviewing the cards to see if she knew what the pictures were to start with.

I loved this! She was examining her baby doll's eyes the same way, but using a block to cover one eye.

Dr. Cheng is so good with kids!! We are thrilled to have found him!

The determination of the exam is that she is farsighted.  When she's focusing on something close, her left eye turns in/crosses because it is unable to focus clearly. The concern with that is without correction, eventually the brain stops using the eye and vision is lost in that eye.  So, we left with a prescription for glasses and instructions to patch her "good eye"  1-2 hours a day to strengthen the weaker one.  Dr. Cheng did say it's possible for her to outgrow her glasses as she grows.  Considering everyone in her family wears glasses, we were hopeful it would be an easy transition for her.  Luckily it was!

We picked up a temporary patch on the way home until we could find some more information about patching.  Patching has been the most difficult part of the whole thing. Some days she doesn't complain, some days it's like torture.  We also went that same afternoon to order glasses for her.  She picked them herself because we wanted her to be comfortable in them so she'd wear them!  I think she did perfectly!

Follow-up appointment coming up...