He is making a ridiculously cute fish face in this picture, but it's actually the crazy left eye I'm referring to.
I thought to myself, "that can't be good" and started making some phone calls. After talking to my Dad, and realizing it was an all at once now all the time kind of thing, I emailed the pediatrician and told him of the problem and of my concerns. He promptly responded and set me up with an opthamologist. He said it sounded like Esotropia. Which essentially means one or both of the eyes crossing inward. I then called Nate's mom, Anne and talked to her about what was going on since I knew she had been there. Nate had a few eye surgeries, patching and glasses when he was Beckham's age.
We had to wait a little over a week to get into the Doctor and in the mean time, crazy eye was getting worse. Nate and I found it hard to look at him without cringing a bit. One night when the neighbor girl came over to play she said, " Jeanine, what's wrong with Beckham's eye, he looks loco?" I totally agreed.
We had a scare one night after talking to my sister about his eye, she called her friend who is an eye doctor and he said it could be much worse, like and aneurysm or stroke. Yes, I freaked out and went into my room and cried for a second before pulling it together and figuring out if I needed to take him to the ER. After going through some tests with lights and such in Beckham's eye, and relaying the results, and sending a picture of his crazy eye to my Dad, it was decided that it wasn't an emergency and that he could wait till his appointment. I have said this before, but I am so grateful to have a Doctor in the family. What a blessing!
So, this morning, Nate took the a.m off of work, and Anne came up to watch the little girl for us so we could take our little guy to the Doctor. Not just a Doctor, but what ended up being 4 different Doctors spanning 4 hours. Lots of bribery and fruit snacks and story telling took place to keep this kid calm and looking in the machines and sitting still. It wasn't perfect, but we got the job done, and turns out the first step is glasses. He is so far-sided and has been compensating very well thus far, but his left eye just got tired and gave in to the loco.
We picked out a great pair of frames and I have to say he looked pretty cute. Reminded me of this:
Yeah, that's the Jerry Maguire kid.
The trick will be getting him to keep them on his face. The Doctor said kids who are this far-sided at this young of an age will most likely be glasses-for-life kind of people. Nate feels bad, like he passed on the bum eye gene, which he did. He said kids with glasses get made fun of more, and it's a bit harder for them. He can still be a line-man right? I'm hoping my little smarty pants nerdy boy has all the same chances the non-4 eyed kids have. At least he will be able to see. His Dad turned out pretty good, even if he is a bit nerdy. He still got me to marry him.
We are hoping this corrects the problem, but will go back in 2 months to evaluate his progress, and if needs be, we will have to patch and after that surgery. I was hoping for patch today so I didn't have to come up with a halloween costume. Ready made pirate.
We will pick up the glasses in a week or so and I'll post a picture.
I feel relieved that crazy eye will be leaving us soon, and that it was something that was fixable, and covered by insurance.
7 comments:
Our oldest wears glasses, she has amblyopia, which sounds similar to what you kiddo has. One eye is stronger than the other, and she has to work hard to compensate for it. Luckily is was caught at a young age, and by wearing glasses and patching at home for about a year, her weak eye became stronger, and now she is 20/20. They still want her in glasses, so the weak eye doesn't weaken again, but we are really grateful that it was caught early, or the condition becomes permanent. Plus, her dr. will give her an rx for contacts in about 6 months...that helps the self esteem issue!
Good luck, I'm glad it wasn't something scary!
oh man. been there done that. g had an auto-immune disorder where he would get 104+ fevers every few months. with the fevers, he would get strabismus. no fever- no lazy eye. then it just stuck. he had it all the time. we did the patching. we did the glasses. it did not help. the pediatric ophthalmologist and his ped. ENT thinks the fevers may have shorted a nerve. so he had surgery. he did a GREAT job. now it is fine, he doesn't need glasses- although he might later. when he gets really tired, it goes a little bit in. but he's totally fine now.
if you want info on where we went and all that- email me
rosiebug79@hotmail.com
don't be scared!!! it's VERY VERY common in little kids. if you look on my blog- way back in 07, there are pictures of his lazy eye.
oh and the ped ophthalmologist we went to is one of the best in the country- he's in san diego. TOTALLY worth the drive!
My little brother Josh has ambliopia but they didn't catch it until his kindergarten checkup. At that time it was too Kate for surgery so he had to wear a patch for about a year. My mom cried when he got his glasses. She still cries when she looks at his preschool pics. Good luck keeping them on him! Josh got his at Target optical, which was luckily just a few minutes away...I swear he was in there every week getting them adjusted from all the bangs and bumps that little boys have!! Can't wait to see Beckham in his glasses! I think it's cute - and amazing what they can do now with medical advances! It sounds like you are in good hands.
Kids in glasses are the cutest. Like you said, the important thing is that he'll be able to see! That looks exactly what Easton's little friend has...she is now wearing a patch and glasses...also passed on from the dad. He'll look so cute and you'll be happy he can see!
Beckham is going to look awesome in little frames. I can't wait to see how he looks.
What MD did you see?? Always curious about who's doing what out there. I would have done the same thing for him, so I'm glad to hear they didn't suggest surgery right away. If you have to patch, I have a great website for ordering really cute kid patches.
Hope you're doing well!
Wow... how stressful! I'm glad it is not too serious and that they can correct. Sean had something similar, so it's good to know I should pay attention if Ethan shows any signs. Can't wait to see a pic of your kiddo in the glasses!
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