Vision questions

Lately, I've fielded a lot of questions about Regan's glasses, vision, eyes, etc. "How did you know she needed glasses?", "What made you think there was something wrong with her vision?", etc. I thought I'd write a bit about Regan's eyes.

Her vision is perfect. She scores perfectly on all the vision screens. Her depth perception is also perfect. So why then does she need glasses?, she has a bit of an exotropia, where one (or both in her case) eyes have a tendency to float outwards when she is tired, lazy, or bored. Noticing this was easy, specifically when she was relaxing or simply "zoning out". We first realized there was a problem 1.5 years ago at the wee age of 3.5 years.

After a quick trip to the pediatrician's office, we started seeing an opthamologist on a regular basis. Regan's eyes thankfully don't stay out, but rather, float in/out only when she's tired. This is important because it meant we had options. Our first option was to try patching. We did this for weeks on end, one eye one day, the next eye the next day. It wasn't real successful, although I'm ready to try again. The next option was glasses, more specifically cheater glasses. This option was started just over a year ago and she continues to wear glasses, because it works. When she has them on, her eyes stay focused! If she takes them off (i.e. for bath or swimming), we can see her eye occasionally take a little trip out. Our most recent adventure is to try a computer program with vision therapy; you see, live-in-person vision therapy would be the ideal. Unfortunately it's not covered by insurance and has a price tag well over $1500. The computer program was less than $100 and while it is as much fun as watching paint dry, we're giving it a try.

I've done my research, I've talked with experts. One doctor has said we are headed down the road to surgery to correct the problem. Another expert has said Regan doesn't need surgery because her depth perception/vision remains perfect. And surgery really won't fix the problem, just cosmetically make it appear better. Wouldn't you know it, insurance pays for the surgery. Odd. Someone had their priorities mixed up. So for now we will keep plugging away with the boring computer program and hope for the best.

Funky glasses came along with the computer program,

she doesn't particularly care for them either.

So with her perfect vision and minor cosmetic problem, you might see why we (or I) am completely hesitant to put her under the knife. Besides, she loves getting compliments on her beautiful glasses (not the ones up above) and they're pretty fashionable!