devasted at ds having poor sight

[wishingiwas]

I feel devasted- my ds aged 2.5 has really poor sight (+4.5). I am so shocked as he appears to see fine - has he been going through life thus far not seeing?? Must have been awful.

We have been for glasses today - I cant see him keeping them on and I have to say they realy dont suit him. Sounds awfully but he does not look cute - just geeky. I will of course be mega positive to him and all.

He has a lazy eye too which is why I took him - I imagined they would patch it - but apprently not at this stage - just the glasses which I did not expect.

I know it is stupid as eleswhere in the smae hospital a friend son is struggling with 'real' sickness. But I feel so upset. Even dh was close to tears.

A few points for the OP to ponder:

1. He probably could see, due to being so young and the muscles being quite flexible, hence you didn't quite realise, so dont worry, and even if he could not see that well, its all he knew, and he will really "feel" the benefit of the glasses which is a good thing.

1. He might be +4 now, but things can change. I was a hell of a lot more than +4, I think I was at least +6 in my left eye. Things kept changing in the right direction, and now I'm in my mid 30's and I'm +2.25 in my left eye and +1.75 in my right, and wear daily disposable contacts. Most people dont realise I dont have 20/20 vision, or in fact that I dont even have binocular vision.

1. I can still see without my glasses and could all my life. I'm told one day I wont be able to due to age. At mid 30's and still waiting, that will probably be around the time everyone else gets glasses anyway. He may or may not be the same.

1. Long sightedness can look nicer than short sightedness, depending on glasses style and your general appearance, but while we are discussing appearances, you will only get slightly larger looking eyes, not much smaller looking eyes from the coke bottle effect that you can get in the higher short sighted prescriptions. Having said that, none of them look as bad as they did when I was a kid as they have improved lenses. If you really hate his (presumably NHS) glasses, double check that they are the most highly technological lenses (as thin and least convex) that money can buy. If not, you can throw some money at the problem and perhaps make him look less geeky to you. If that is the aim. In time, you will probably not find that is necessary. It might be that the NHS provide the best possible looking lenses anyway. But there can be a pretty big difference if you get the more expensive ones. He is very young though and will possibly trash them so you might wait till he's at least school aged.

1. Glasses is a main stream, common and often diagnosed before school type problem these days. He wont be the only kid at school with them. They do not impact on learning or intelligence, as long as the child can see the blackboard (do they still have blackboards? I am old)

1. He's still your perfect little guy.

When DS was 4 or 5 all the boys desperately wanted to wear glasses because of Harry Potter. DH is very short sighted, he wears prescription goggles for swimming pools. One of my friends has been blind in one eye since birth and very poor eyesight in the other. The only thing she can't do is drive.

While I wouldn't wish any myopia on my daughter, I'd be secretly quite pleased if she had to wear glasses. I think they add an air of quirky difference and look very sweet.

Ok, ok. That's shallow of me. But no, I would not be upset at all, but would support my daughter if she was upset and help her get nice glasses as she grew up.

I had short sight undiagnosed until teens (-2, -3, so really minor) and half-liked, half-hated wearing glasses and contacts. I finally got my eyes lasered which worked very well.

I am sorry you've had a shock though. But I still think YABU.

My mum is in her 80s, with perfect sight, and she's still going on about how devastated she is about my "handicap". I was never bothered, though, because I was just me... I thought my handicap was being flat-chested.

So I'm not surprised you're upset, but your DS will be upset about something entirely different.

I understand why you feel the way you do OP. I was like your ds, 4.5+ and 6.5+ with a lazy eye which surgery did not correct. I would feel very sad if my dc's had my eye problems.

I wear contact lenses now which correct my sight and my lazy eye so no one could tell by looking.

all I'll say with regard to glasses is if you can afford to pay the extra to have to lenses ultra thinned it is well, well worth it. It improves the appearance of the specs and stops the magnification of the eyes that you get with thick lenses. Although you must pick the style of the glasses carefully as not all shapes of frame allow the lenses to be thinned really well (the smaller the frame the harder it is to get them nice and thin and half frames are not suitable either)

Glasses can look fab just take advice on getting the right ones

i think you are being slightly unreasonable i understand your shocked but your post sounds so shallow i'd just concentrate on the fact that you have a lovely healthy little child which is a blessing my sisters little boy has a tumour running through his eye and she has been to hell and back operations ect to try and make him comfortable she would give anything to just correct it with a pair of glasses. you will get used to it and realise how lucky you are.

My DD (5.6) loves her glasses. She especially looks fabulous in her Hello Kitty oversized prescription sunglasses!

I understand. My DD1 is +10. She was diagnosed at just two (a squint) and I wept and wept. But she is fine. In the great scheme of things it just isn't that big a deal. As they said at Moorfields, eye surgery and correction ops are improving every year. And yes, when you go to Moorfields or other eye depts you will come across children who are blind or whose sight is so unstable that they could go blind at any time - and realise that your DS' problem is trivial in comparison. From the age of 7 onwards his short sighted pals will start wearing glasses.

But I understand that you don't feel fantastic about it. It's a pain to get such a young child to wear glasses but they will, don't worry - and the glasses themselves might well stop the squint. As Connor says, try and get thin lenses.

Oh - one thing - you might read or hear that the prescription will diminish as the child gets older and the eye enlarges. But that isn't necessarily a steady progression (if at all). My DD's prescription now just starting to go down as her growth rate increases (she's just 11).

it's amazing that I manage to do anything at all then - considering I've been totally blind since birth! I even go swimming!

Some of the responses on this thread are a very good illustration of why the attitudes to disability are the way they are in this country.

"And I'm just annoyed with certain posters who are inferring that wearing glasses is a disaster and will stop you doing things.

200 years ago, yes, but not now."

Erm, no, actually I'm not inferring anything.

I am stating the fact that I cannot swim because I was not allowed to take part in my schools swimming lessons.

Because I wore glasses.

Last time I checked, I'm not 200 years old.

I may feel it, but that's a whole other thread.

Devastated seems a bring strong tbh.

DD has worn glasses since she was 18 months old. There were lots of kids in her Nursery and are lots at her school in glasses - it doesn't seem to be something kids are bullied about anymore. That said I was never bullied about glasses and only got laser surgery because the price of my prescription was becoming ridiculous and in the long term it made financial sense.

Ladyintheradiator - you may have to shop around to find an opticians able and willing to test a very young child. Most of the big chains seems to want to wait until the child is at school and confident with reading letters (not sure if this is just because it makes their own lives easier though).

bitter - but you can't not swim because you wear glasses. You can't swim because someone decided that you shouldn't - because you wear glasses - there is a difference.

I can't drive a car because I can't see. (well I can but not legally or safely ). But I know people who can't cook, or go to the shops by themselves, or dress themselves (yes really) or make a cup of tea because people around them decided that them not being able to see meant they can't do these things and therefore never allowed them to do these things. They could learn to do all these things - not being able to see hasn't caused them not to, it's peoples' attitudes to them not being able to see, iyswim.

Lady I don't know about eye tests in general, but the way they do them is with a series of charts which range depending on the age of the child, so it is actually possible to test the sight of a very young baby by following the way they focus on say, a single line on a card..

BitterAndTwisted, I think it is unwise to infer anything about our own children's epxeriences at school from our own memories: things have changed so much. Schools these days are meant to be inclusive; that means they have to come up with a solution to a problem like yours.

WannaBe, I concede your point

Lady, DS had to have his eyes tested from very young, before he could talk much.

They use pictures and symbols and it can be done.

Eyetests for children are free, but I'm not sure if you need to be referred through your GP.

If you ask your optician, they will know.

I like wearing glasses. I'm moderately short-sighted. DH is very short-sighted, gets free eye tests (and a miniscule amount off the cost of his glasses) and really cannot see without them. But it's something that can be corrected isn't it? I swim with prescription goggles. DH wears contacts and ordinary goggles. I dare say my DC will require specs . They try specs on whenever we are in the opticians. They do look geeky I suppose, but so do I and I work that look

" am stating the fact that I cannot swim because I was not allowed to take part in my schools swimming lessons.

Because I wore glasses."

A girl in DS class is extremely short sighted (when she was little couldn't see her mother if she was just 3 feet away) and had swimming lessons. She took her glasses off on the side of the pool one of her friends helped her into the pool and she had her lesson, as I said previously DH has prescription goggles for swimming.

My friend who is effectively blind swims on a weekly basis.
Lady my dcs had eye tests from little, they had to pick up tiny sweets from the testers hand, look at pictures of animals etc. Eye tests are free for children.

I could barely see anyone's face in the pool when I was young but used to love swimming, it didn't bother me at all, now I have prescription goggles.

Basically, these days if a child was being excluded from school activities on such flimsy grounds, you could kick up a big stink and make sure it didn't happen again.

Cory, I get what you are saying, I guess it's just human nature to let negative experiences cloud your judgement.

I am sure DD will love her glasses, as I will mine.

I suppose I just felt I understood where the OP was coming from.

Ladyintheradiator, try a small local independent optician (mine have been seeing DS since he was 2.5). Failing that, there are specialist paediatric optometrists, who can test vision from babyhood (I know definitely of one in Croydon and there are others elsewhere). Your local eye hospital or children's development centre should be able to point you to an optician who'll deal with little kids too. If you're worried about your DC's sight, you can get a referral from your GP to the children's development centre where they'll test their eyes by seeing if they can pick up tiny beads, name pictures/match the picture they're holding up with one on a card he's holding etc. An optician will also use the picture-matching technique, but will, in addition, put drops in their eyes to paralyse the pupil, and they'll then use lenses to arrive at an accurate prescription.
OP, you'll get used to the glasses on your DS's face. Even coming from a spectacle-wearing family, and wearing them myself, it was still a shock when DS suddenly sprouted a pair

I have worn glasses since being a toddler, not a big deal as well and in fact can be quite fun when changing frames - quite funky ones available now.

I had an exercise in gratitude yesterday, DS2 needed a checkup at the kid's outpatients for something. Some kids get a CRAP deal.

YABU to be devastated, a bit upset (like I was with DS1's talipes), but it really will make bugger all difference to his quality of life. He might get a bit grumpy in the mornings if he can't remember where he pt them down...or that could just be me.