First Glasses Day

Today Cal started wearing glasses. A week ago we had yet another second opinion from another ophthalmologist because we weren't happy with the apathy our initial one was showing in regard to helping strengthen Cal’s vision as much as possible and showing any curiosity about what he can see rather than settling for knowing what he can’t see. So when we saw the new doctor we had the mixed blessing of finding out that he is far-sighted in his good eye and needs glasses to correct it. The silver lining to that news is that wearing glasses to fix the farsightedness could straighten out his eyes so he might not have to have an alignment surgery when he’s older. We are glad we took him in again. Second opinions, folks. Get them! Cal picked out frames that were black and thick because he said “Uncle A!” when he saw them. It turned out that the black ones were too big for him, but the brown ones that looked vaguely Uncle A-ish were his size. So we ordered them.

Cal's glasses and band

Then the other day Cal’s bad eye seemed to be either having an allergic reaction or be infected. We took his contact out and expected it to clear up. When it didn't clear up overnight we both feared that it might be the sign of something related to the pressure in the eye, which led us to think glaucoma. He has been at high risk for glaucoma since his first surgery. Yesterday his retina specialist found a scratch on his cornea, presumably from something on his contact lens. With some antibiotic drops today, the eye has cleared up nicely. Next week he will have an EUA (exam under anesthesia) for routine measuring and pressure checking, but also to see if his contact lens strength needs to increase or decrease and to get a prescription for a progressive lens in addition to his contact on that right eye. Now is the time that his eyes are developing so we want to do all we possibly can to strengthen them. Once he hits nine or so the eyes will be done developing. We also found out that he needs to be patched more than he has been. Six hours a day while wearing glasses. Anything we can do to get this little guy the best possible vision is what we'll continue to do.

 Before we started this first day of glasses I looked up some helpful articles on getting toddlers to wear glasses and our day has been much better than I thought it would be based on his shrieking last night when we tried them on. We got a sports strap from a sporting goods store and this morning I made a stickers chart for motivation. Every time he wears his glasses for one “thing” he gets a sticker and he earns a sticker for Clark. I figured this might provide a little peer pressure for him to wear the glasses too. 

He kept his glasses on A L L through breakfast!

...and through watching home videos after breakfast

The chart has worked way better than I expected it would. First he wore them for a session of two Jimmy Buffet songs while riding the rocking horse. Then he wore them all through breakfast, during six stories, etc. He clearly can see better with them on. I put a bunch of children’s books about kids getting glasses on hold at the library and we looked at a photo gallery of a bunch of toddlers wearing glasses. Because of the eye infection we won’t start patching again for week or so. That gives him awhile to adjust to the glasses before he has to deal with both. What a trooper he is. Great first glasses day!

Playing music on Gammy's iPad