2yo very long-sighted (+6.50) and developmental delay

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Hi 👋🏼 Are there any opticians/optometrists on here or anyone with a similar experience that can give me an honest opinion on how bad my 2.5 year old’s vision is please?

High Street opticians used the dilating eye drops and said his prescription was +6.50. He has been prescribed glasses (although not the full prescription) which he took to instantly which I guess shows how bad his vision is/was. He has now been referred to the eye hospital for monitoring although we are still waiting to receive an appointment.

I’m just wondering how severe a +6.50 prescription is for a 2.5 year old? I did ask the optometrist but they weren’t particularly forthcoming. I will ask the eye hospital when we get the appointment but not sure how long that will be. He has a speech delay but now nursery are saying he is behind in other areas too and I’m wondering if it’s vision that has contributed to this developmental delay or if it’s something else.

Thank you

I’m not an optician, but it might be worth asking a behavioural opthamologist? I’m not sure if they can assess that young. But they look at visual processing (not just eyesight) and how it can contribute to general delays in development/other challenges. There’s an association so you can search for one in your area.

This is about my prescription,

To give you an idea - without my glasses I cannot read at all. It's not that the letters are blurry I just can't tell they are there at all.

A page of text is a mass of black and white fuzz.

I can see the TV but wouldn't be able to work out if there were any people on it or what was happening as it would just be coloured blobs.

I got my glasses at 3.

I can imagine a problem with eyesight to that extent will have caused other problems. I have no depth perception without my glasses and can't tell where the edges of things are - used to fall in swimming pools until I got my prescription goggles.

Wow, ok this has really put things into perspective for me (and made me a bit teary). In that case I think I need to be thinking how well he has done in spite of his vision, rather than thinking about the things he isn’t able to do. I’m hoping he will gradually catch up now that he has glasses and can see properly 🫤

My mum was very short sighted and it did hold her back at school a bit. When very young she and her equally poorly sighted brother were obviously quite impaired and it was suggested to my grandmother that they go to a school for the blind. My grandmother refused. This was in the 1930s. Both went on to have regular working lives. Neither were ever well sighted enough to learn to drive, but lived full lives and benefitted from better ophthalmics over time.

My son is 4 and is +8.25 in one eye and +6.25 in the other. This has increased since his initial test at 3. He does pretty well without his glasses, got him out the bath the other day and forgot to put them on and we did a search and find book like where's Wally (although not as small). He was quicker than me so whilst I'm sure it's blurry, it couldn't be that bad.

Following this thread because I'm in a similar position OP. My 2 years 10 months DD was diagnosed earlier this year, prescription +6.5 & +7 with astigmatism. I noticed her eye turning in around February and alerted our health visitor who referred her to our local children's orthoptics service. She's been wearing glasses since March, and has adjusted well to them, but the partial correction they prescribed her initially has only brought her visual acuity up to borderline, and there is a small (4D) residual esotropia with her glasses, so she's just been prescribed the full correction now and we're waiting for her new glasses to be ready to pick up.
It doesn't seem to have held her back too much developmentally. One thing that was flagged up at her 2 year review was that her fine motor skills were behind, and this has definitely improved since she started wearing the glasses.
I wish now that I had taken her for an eye test sooner, before I noticed any problems, but hopefully by picking it up at age 2 there's still enough time for visual development to correct!

@RedRose1612 there's plenty of time! She'll be absolutely fine. By noticing it so quickly you've given her the best opportunity to have great vision in both eyes.

Her prescription will also reduce a little bit in her teenage years and she'll be able to wear contact lenses too.

Dd was a +7.5 at age 2. She's now a +6.5 age 20. It's not caused her any issues really. She's worn contacts for years. Maybe slight issue with her 3d vision so not good at tennis.

My ds had this prescription just before he turned 3.
He’s now an adult and it had reduced to somewhere around d +2.5.
He had sports goggles and prescription swim goggles (bought online) but these days just leaves his glasses off for Sport

Thank you so much for sharing your experiences, it's very reassuring to know that for your children the prescription did reduce as they grew and that it doesn't cause them issues as adults.

@Hopewewill I really worry about the impact on my DD's 3d vision. I don't have any myself and thus am very bad at sports like tennis! I know it's not the biggest issue in the grand scheme of things but I really hope DD can still develop at least some 3d vision. It sounds like your DD did even if it's not perfect?

@Treviarpelli I just ordered my DD some prescription swim goggles for her lessons. At first I just left her glasses off but now she's used to them she really struggles without them so I hope the goggles will help!

My daughter was +10 i think - she got glasses at age 2. She is never without them as she cant see much without (the minute she wakes up she will feel for them). She was diagnosed at 4 months but didnt get glasses until later (looking back im not sure why they waited so long, eith hindsight I wish I had pushed it). She is absolutely fine now in terms of development, though she was an unsettled baby and I wonder if the combination of severe long sightedness and deafness (moderate hearing impairment which she got hearing aids for at 1) were the reasons