DD born with severe squint

[mifi]

My DD was born with a obvious squint in both eyes and is now on waiting list for surgery. I know this is fairly common op but was frightend by consultants comment about small risk of blindness. Has anybody got children who have had this op and had success. I am wavering as to whether we have made right decision to have op as its for cosmetic reasons only but know she will be taunted at school for being "cross eyed" as older children have already made comments, and she's only 3.

Hey, I've had the op!

I didn't know it was cosmetic though. I don't have any recollection of being bullied for wearing glasses for a while, but I do remember being bought a kitten!

I still have a tiny little red pin-prick mark on my hand where they put the needle in for the anaesthetic.

HTH.

I've had it done twice. Mine wasn't for cosmetic reasons as I get double vision, and in many children the brain will switch off the squinting eye if its not corrected, leading to effective blindness in the eye.

Much better to get it done now - if its obvious she would really want to get it done later on and it hurts more then

My ds2 had a complex eye op when he was 5.

I was terrified for years as knew it was coming.

On the day, we were all fine. The surgeons and nurses were completely fantastic, and the surgery (never done before at our hospital and never by our surgeon) was a complete success.

HTH.

Thanks guys. Its the hurting part (and the risks of course) Im worried about! As a parent it feels wrong to be responsable for putting your child through pain for cosmetic reasons. Been told as her squint is in both eyes and she doesnt use one more than the other her vision will not be improved but does require glasses for minor short sightedness Bowddee and Cmotdibbler were your ops a success and on both eyes?

ds3 has this. His eyes turn outwards which is less usual.
He;s on the waiting list for surgery but I am wavering. HIs eye sight is developing normally and his squint isn't permanently obvious (although it is very obvious at times). I haven't heard from them for months but am not chasing If he has it I know he'll react really badly to it.

My nephew has had op several times for is squint. His squint was exceptionally severe.

I don't think the op is cosmetic as it improved his quality of life no end. How your face looks make a huge difference to a child's confidence. The nhs does not offer cosmetic surgery for trival reasons.

Any my newphew has reasonably good eye sight. The only problem he has is that his eyes don't work together which makes it harder to judge distances.

I had both eyes done separatly, and although it wasn't a total sucess, my ability to see one of things is hugely better than it was, and with prisms in my glasses, you'd never know that I have had a really severe divergent squint.

The way mine works is that I can correct it - but it needs a lot of effort and will cause me a lot of pain by the end of a short time with no correction (even now, so I will get a cracking headache after an eye test. It is particularly hard to hold when working in closeup so reading can be very challenging as the letters sort of dance when you are trying to hold vision.

It runs in my family, both me and my brother had one eye. My operation was a sucess and the only thing I notice is that my 'squint' eye often gets tired quicker than my other eye and I find myself reading with it shut. But otherwise its totally normal. My brother is ok too.

My little boy has had the op when he was just turning two. He was born with a severe squint but the operation was a complete success!

I was in pieces on the day but i am really pleased now that it was done. My sister has also had the op too! My ds (now 6) wears glasses and has an eye patch on for two hours a day to correct a lazy eye-he doesnt even remember having the op done!