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Pre-School and Daycare
XP: Eye sight question for my nephew....
My nephew is 10 months old and has had a clogged tear duct since he was born. My sil went to a pedi eye doc about scheduling surgery to have it opened up and found a possible astigmatism in his clogged eye. This is what she said:
He had his pre-op appt. today and the Dr. said he has an astigmatism in his right eye which is the eye that also has the clogged tear duct. He asked if he rubs his eye alot and I said he rubs it and we rub it to get the excess water and junk off of it. He said that it very well could have been caused by that and that if we stop rubbing it and make sure he doesn't rub his eye, it will most likely correct itself. He wants me to come back in 6 months to get another check on his eye and see what it looks like then. He didn't want to schedule the surgery just yet, he said for me to massage his eye a certain way to try and get the tear duct open and if it doesn't open in a month we can go ahead and have the surgery done. I called Jake's Pedi to talk to him about the whole glasses thing because I was in tears over it. He said that he has never seen a baby Jake's age that needs glasses but he can't say it's not out of the question either. He told me to get a second opinion and so that's what I'm going to do...I'm calling to make an appt with this other Dr. on Monday...I hope he doesn't need them!
She asked me to post this and wanted to know if anyone has been in a similiar situation or has any advice. Carson had this done at 9 months old to open his tear duct and was fine, no eye sight problems.
TIA for any helpful advice!
This discussion has been closed.
Re: XP: Eye sight question for my nephew....
As a mom of a child who started wearing glasses at 2 and who's in the pedi optho's office frequently I've seen PLENTY of kids younger than your nephew wearing glasses.
I'm floored her pedi would have told her that he's never seen a baby Jake's age need glasses.
Stunned.
This is why smart doctors refer people to specialists.
I don't have any advice as our issue isn't the same but I can share what I've learned doing TONS of research on children's eyes, glasses wearing, patching, etc.
The sooner you can get a child into glasses when there's a vision issue (most issues), the better. Especially if one eye is in worse shape than the other.
The brain is building synapses to the eye from birth to age 6. After that it pretty much stops. When a child has a dominant eye the brain kinda goes into "Ok.... that one works so we'll focus our efforts there" mode and won't build as many connections to the weaker eye. THIS is why corrective lenses, patching, etc is sooooo important. It can have a huge impact on the quality of their vision once they're older. If the brain misses the chance to build those synapses before age 6 you're going to have limited correction after age 6.
I understand her being upset about the glasses. It took me a few days for it to all sink in and I cried because I didn't want him to have to deal with not being a "normal" kid. I mean.... a 2 year old BOY being saddled with glasses? I couldn't even wrap my mind around how we'd pull that off.
But seriously?
I'll take it.
I've seen stuff on these boards (I think most on this board will remember one very special little lady that we all held our breaths for terrified of the outcome of a brain tumor situation) that has made me realize that glasses are NOTHING.
If this is the worst we ever face I'll be grateful beyond words.
And the truth is that people think he's adorable in his glasses. His older brother wanted a pair for the first 3 months because he was jealous that his younger brother was being stopped by strangers and told how cute he was.
Other kids don't even notice them on him.
Once we got over the initial hump it's really not a big deal at all - just a normal part of his life. (and that includes patching a 2.5 yr old for at least 2 hours every day)
I'm thrilled the doc is trying to avoid surgery but glad they're setting a reasonable time limit to go ahead and correct the duct surgically if there is no alternative.
But as for the vision issue - the one bit of advice I'd have for her is that she's LUCKY that it's being discovered this early (if it's even an issue at all).
My pedi optho told me that my pedi did an amazing job finding Jace's issues at his 2 year well child visit and told me over and over again that the earlier they can get corrective lenses on a child the better the outcome because it gives the brain more time to build those connections and make the most use out of the weaker eye. She literally told me that by getting him in glasses now his eyes (specifically the weaker one) will not deteriorate as much as it would have if this had been left undiscovered and untreated even for another year!
(and by weaker I just mean that Jace's vision is better in his right eye than his left - he doesn't have any issues other than generic near sightedness that's worse in one eye than the other and astigmatism in both eyes. He's a carbon copy of his dad's eyes. His diagnosis didn't come as a huge surprise in that regard)
I know it's tough to consider your baby facing these kinds of challenges but please pass along to her that glasses have been no biggie for us once we got into the groove and over the initial period of him wanting to rip them off his face every time we put them on him.
I look back on pictures of him now and think he looks weird without his glasses on.
The pic in my siggy has no glasses because we were outside and he's got transitions lenses due to our attempts to avoid UV rays on his eyes because we live at altitude. For indoor professional photos I plan to pop out his lenses so he can have the glasses on in his pics. They're just who he is now!
Total score: 6 pregnancies, 5 losses, 2 amazing blessings that I'm thankful for every single day.
Wanted to add that if he ends up needing glasses and wants someone to talk to I'd be happy to chat with her.
Just page me if/when the time comes and I'll pass along my e-mail addy.
There's some tricks we tried that helped distract him when he first started wearing the glasses. I'm sure it will be trickier at Jake's age but they'll get thru it and before long she won't remember a time he didn't have them on.
Total score: 6 pregnancies, 5 losses, 2 amazing blessings that I'm thankful for every single day.
My older DD had a clogged tear duct, we saw the eye doc at 1 year and he didn't feel surgery was necessary at that point and we did the massage stuff. At her 18 month follow up, the clogged duct was gone.