Feeling extremely guilty.
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Chelmsford mum
- Posts: 2113
- Joined: Sat Feb 21, 2009 7:16 pm
Hi Ed's mum,
As the kids would say "snap"!
My middle DD exactly the same, same age as well when it was picked up.
It was the first term of year 6.I was shocked, tbh I only even took her for an eye test because we were stood in a queue in M&S and they had an opticians type chart for the reading glasses they sell.She couldn't get beyond the second line. 
When she went for the eye test I was staggered how many errors she made.I said afterwards
" Don't you have trouble seeing the whiteboard in school ?"
"yes sometimes its really difficult " she said blythely.
Console yourself with the thought that because your daughter, like mine, had never complained and was doing very, very well at school, it doesn't occur that there could be a problem.After she got her glasses, I took DD1 for a test and was told "near 20/ 20 vision" for her.
Nothing had flagged up to me that they were different in their eyesight and yet the eyetest results were so different.
Children don't come with manuals and we aren't mind readers.Don't feel guilty.She is well loved and cared for and has a bright future ahead of her.
[/u]
As the kids would say "snap"!
My middle DD exactly the same, same age as well when it was picked up.
It was the first term of year 6.I was shocked, tbh I only even took her for an eye test because we were stood in a queue in M&S and they had an opticians type chart for the reading glasses they sell.She couldn't get beyond the second line. When she went for the eye test I was staggered how many errors she made.I said afterwards
" Don't you have trouble seeing the whiteboard in school ?"
"yes sometimes its really difficult " she said blythely.
Console yourself with the thought that because your daughter, like mine, had never complained and was doing very, very well at school, it doesn't occur that there could be a problem.After she got her glasses, I took DD1 for a test and was told "near 20/ 20 vision" for her.
Nothing had flagged up to me that they were different in their eyesight and yet the eyetest results were so different.
Children don't come with manuals and we aren't mind readers.Don't feel guilty.She is well loved and cared for and has a bright future ahead of her.
[/u]-
Midget Man
- Posts: 950
- Joined: Mon Nov 16, 2009 8:28 pm
- Location: Bucks
My 6(amost 7yr) old daughter has just been given glasses. I took her annually last year and the opitcian's referred her to the hospital yet they did nothing. Then a few week's ago I took the children for another annual check-up and the optician was livid, it was apparently never a question of whether she needed glasses, but to which type 
So almost a year before she had what she needed.
All you can do is do your best by your children and you have, we are unable to take back that time when thing's weren't done and have to just be pleased that atleast thing's are being dealt with now, but big hugs to you
So almost a year before she had what she needed. All you can do is do your best by your children and you have, we are unable to take back that time when thing's weren't done and have to just be pleased that atleast thing's are being dealt with now, but big hugs to you
The problem with children who have sight/hearing difficulties is they don't realise how it affects them because they have never known any difference or because it has crept up so slowly they don't realise it.
When my dd saw her consultant last July she was told her hearing had deteriorated to such a state she now needed to wear a hearing aid in one ear (her other ear is borderline for an aid).
She was heartbroken and took a while to talk round and only agreed to it because it was the holidays and we agreed if she tried it during the holidays and didn't find it helpful she didn't have to wear it.
The day they fitted it was one I'll never forget. We sat there in the audiologists room whilst she 'tuned' it in and then, all of a sudden, a huge smile lit up dd's face and she said 'I can hear' - she hadn't actually realised how bad her hearing had become because she had relied on lip reading, sitting on top of the tv with it turned up loud, contextual clues and plain old common sense (which has since disappeared). She now happily wears her aid without prompting, looks after it re: cleaning/chaning battery and loves it.
She is especially pleased that it's so invisible even a GP looking into her hears the other month didn't realise she was wearing one and wondered why he couldn't access her ear canal
Her party piece is making it squeal and having people look round wondering where the noise has come from!!
But she still won't tell her friends at new school she wears one - and asked if she'd won an art competition at school because she was deaf and they felt sorry for her (teachers obviously know about her condition)
When my dd saw her consultant last July she was told her hearing had deteriorated to such a state she now needed to wear a hearing aid in one ear (her other ear is borderline for an aid).
She was heartbroken and took a while to talk round and only agreed to it because it was the holidays and we agreed if she tried it during the holidays and didn't find it helpful she didn't have to wear it.
The day they fitted it was one I'll never forget. We sat there in the audiologists room whilst she 'tuned' it in and then, all of a sudden, a huge smile lit up dd's face and she said 'I can hear' - she hadn't actually realised how bad her hearing had become because she had relied on lip reading, sitting on top of the tv with it turned up loud, contextual clues and plain old common sense (which has since disappeared). She now happily wears her aid without prompting, looks after it re: cleaning/chaning battery and loves it.
She is especially pleased that it's so invisible even a GP looking into her hears the other month didn't realise she was wearing one and wondered why he couldn't access her ear canal
Her party piece is making it squeal and having people look round wondering where the noise has come from!!
But she still won't tell her friends at new school she wears one - and asked if she'd won an art competition at school because she was deaf and they felt sorry for her (teachers obviously know about her condition)
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Loopyloulou
- Posts: 878
- Joined: Fri Aug 29, 2008 5:20 pm
Please don't feel bad Ed's Mum. I am sure she will never dream of holding it against you. The only good thing I have to say about Harry Potter is that he has made the wearing of glasses cool.
I had my first ever eye test at 44. ( Appallingly negligent GP father! ). The optician told me I had a quite significant astigmatism and wondered how on earth I coped with driving at night. As I have never learned to drive it has never been an issue. The only problem I am aware of is a slight " discomfort " in my eyes when watching a film at the cinema.
I had my first ever eye test at 44. ( Appallingly negligent GP father! ). The optician told me I had a quite significant astigmatism and wondered how on earth I coped with driving at night. As I have never learned to drive it has never been an issue. The only problem I am aware of is a slight " discomfort " in my eyes when watching a film at the cinema.
I have just had my first pair of glasses at the age of 40-something - I was amazed when putting them on how much clearer road signs, the cinema screen, powerpoint etc became. The daft thing is I only went for an eye test because I was starting to find it hard to read small print which is a totally different problem so I now have varifocals... I'd had a much shorter test (as part of a general "health MOT" earlier this year which didn't pick up any problems. Don't have to wear them all the time, however, unlike OH.
DD (youngest of three) is the only one of mine to need glasses but it was only picked up a couple of years ago when she started to mention she found it hard to see the board sometimes - although eye tests are free for under 16's it's not something i thought about, assuming (as I now know, wrongly) that children would complain sooner. She's had to have a new prescription twice since then, and has got more expensive taste in frames now unfortunately! DS1 had eye tests as a teenager when he had some headaches but there was no problem.
DD (youngest of three) is the only one of mine to need glasses but it was only picked up a couple of years ago when she started to mention she found it hard to see the board sometimes - although eye tests are free for under 16's it's not something i thought about, assuming (as I now know, wrongly) that children would complain sooner. She's had to have a new prescription twice since then, and has got more expensive taste in frames now unfortunately! DS1 had eye tests as a teenager when he had some headaches but there was no problem.
Ed's mum please don't feel guilty. DS1 worn glasses since he was two - has had every check known to man including brain scans. He too has problems with white board pens - red, green, yellow and orange are bad - I informed the school and his teachers now only use black or blue - they are fine about it.
His eye sight is not good and it never will be but it doesn't stop him doing anything at all. He has just progressed to contact lenses which are brilliant and I can thoroughly recommend. Please don't feel guilty - I did for 9 years and have just realised that there is nothing I can do or could have done and hey, there are far worse things in life to have than dodgy eyesight.
His eye sight is not good and it never will be but it doesn't stop him doing anything at all. He has just progressed to contact lenses which are brilliant and I can thoroughly recommend. Please don't feel guilty - I did for 9 years and have just realised that there is nothing I can do or could have done and hey, there are far worse things in life to have than dodgy eyesight.
I think it's normal to feel a little guilty about such things, these are our children and it's our job to look after them, but don't beat yourself up too much about it. The main thing is that your DD can now see properly with her glasses.
LLL mentioned lazy eyes, squints and surgery. I would like to encourage anyone considering surgery to read my DS's story first:
When DS was about 15 months old we noticed that he had a squint in one of his eyes (eye turned inwards) when he was tired. Various people said that this was common and he would grow out of it as his eyes developed. By the time he was 2 years old his eye turned in all the time, not just when he was tired and the Health Visitor referred us to the hospital.
At the hospital we saw an horrendous woman who tried to assess DS's eyesight using various contraptions, upsetting and scaring him in the process. Her verdict was that DS was practically blind in one eye and there was nothing that could be done to improve this. She said that he would never be able to participate in ball sports or ride a bike due to a lack of depth perception / steroscopic vision. She also said that we had better be careful with him because an injury to his good eye could leave him completely blind.
The next step was a referal to the consultant who shared the same opinions as 'nasty woman' above and proceeded to start booking him in for an operation "which will straighten his eye but have no effect on his vision whatsoever and by the way he will need more operations to keep the eye straight as he matures"
Errrr hang on a minute! I think we might just seek a second opinion here!
Much internet research found us the Children's Opticians in Cardiff specialising in behavioural optometry & advocating vision therapy as an alternative to surgery for straightening the eye with the bonus of also improving the eye sight.
Off we went for an appointment and what a difference! DS was assessed through play in a relaxed atmosphere and this is what we were told:
- DS has 20/20 vision in one eye and long-sightedness in the other
- DS's brain was presented with a different image from each eye (a blury one and a clear one) which it was unable to fuse together as one image
- DS's brain therefore shut down images from the bad eye and gained clear mono vision from the good eye.
- The nonpreferred eye was then not adequately stimulated and the visual brain cells did not develop normally
- DS's brain over time didn't bother to try and focus the bad eye and the eye turned in
We were given a series of eye exercises to do at home which involved patching the good eye (but not for hours on end) for 15 mins whilst doing closeup 'games' then more games with the patch off to encourage both eyes to work together. We also had a prescription for glasses with a thick lens in the bad eye and a clear one in the good eye and these were worn all the time.
We persevered with the exercises and several more clinic appointments over the course of the next couple of years. Guess what?
- DS's vision in the bad eye improved by 4 lines on the eye chart
- DS no longer wears glasses
- DS's eyes are now straight
- DS has had no surgery!
- DS is amazing at ball sports
Sometimes I want to go back to the hospital with DS and really show that woman!!!!!
The Children's Opticians have also had huge success working with dyslexic children through vision therapy!
Sorry this is long but just felt I had to share it in case anyone is in a similar boat. I too felt very guilty for not taking action sooner and just trusting that he would grow out of it but as you all know, I couldn't be prouder of my gorgeous boy now. It's possibly the reason why I go on about him so much - there was a time when I thought he would never enjoy a ball sport or ride a bike.
LLL mentioned lazy eyes, squints and surgery. I would like to encourage anyone considering surgery to read my DS's story first:
When DS was about 15 months old we noticed that he had a squint in one of his eyes (eye turned inwards) when he was tired. Various people said that this was common and he would grow out of it as his eyes developed. By the time he was 2 years old his eye turned in all the time, not just when he was tired and the Health Visitor referred us to the hospital.
At the hospital we saw an horrendous woman who tried to assess DS's eyesight using various contraptions, upsetting and scaring him in the process. Her verdict was that DS was practically blind in one eye and there was nothing that could be done to improve this. She said that he would never be able to participate in ball sports or ride a bike due to a lack of depth perception / steroscopic vision. She also said that we had better be careful with him because an injury to his good eye could leave him completely blind.
The next step was a referal to the consultant who shared the same opinions as 'nasty woman' above and proceeded to start booking him in for an operation "which will straighten his eye but have no effect on his vision whatsoever and by the way he will need more operations to keep the eye straight as he matures"
Errrr hang on a minute! I think we might just seek a second opinion here!
Much internet research found us the Children's Opticians in Cardiff specialising in behavioural optometry & advocating vision therapy as an alternative to surgery for straightening the eye with the bonus of also improving the eye sight.
Off we went for an appointment and what a difference! DS was assessed through play in a relaxed atmosphere and this is what we were told:
- DS has 20/20 vision in one eye and long-sightedness in the other
- DS's brain was presented with a different image from each eye (a blury one and a clear one) which it was unable to fuse together as one image
- DS's brain therefore shut down images from the bad eye and gained clear mono vision from the good eye.
- The nonpreferred eye was then not adequately stimulated and the visual brain cells did not develop normally
- DS's brain over time didn't bother to try and focus the bad eye and the eye turned in
We were given a series of eye exercises to do at home which involved patching the good eye (but not for hours on end) for 15 mins whilst doing closeup 'games' then more games with the patch off to encourage both eyes to work together. We also had a prescription for glasses with a thick lens in the bad eye and a clear one in the good eye and these were worn all the time.
We persevered with the exercises and several more clinic appointments over the course of the next couple of years. Guess what?
- DS's vision in the bad eye improved by 4 lines on the eye chart
- DS no longer wears glasses
- DS's eyes are now straight
- DS has had no surgery!
- DS is amazing at ball sports
Sometimes I want to go back to the hospital with DS and really show that woman!!!!!
The Children's Opticians have also had huge success working with dyslexic children through vision therapy!
Sorry this is long but just felt I had to share it in case anyone is in a similar boat. I too felt very guilty for not taking action sooner and just trusting that he would grow out of it but as you all know, I couldn't be prouder of my gorgeous boy now. It's possibly the reason why I go on about him so much - there was a time when I thought he would never enjoy a ball sport or ride a bike.
