New Glasses and How Doctors Test an Infant's Vision

How cute are these? My son looks adorable in his new glasses. They're Go Diego Go! They have tiny animals along the sides. Soooo cute. We had to get new glasses because his glasses snapped in half across the bridge while I was cleaning them. I brought them in to be replaced under the warranty, and dug out his old glasses for him to wear. Somehow, while putting on his old glasses, I managed to snap off the piece that wraps around the ear. Luckily, we had old old glasses, and I put those on him. Last night before his bath, I managed to put those glasses in a spot that I have yet to identify. So, I had to send my poor son to school with broken glasses with only one ear piece. Thank goodness, his new glasses came in today, so I met him at school to put on his new glasses. I can't believe that in two weeks we are on our fourth pair of glasses. AND his frames are supposed to be brown, and they only had blue, so they gave us the blue frames until the brown ones come in. I don't know if we'll be getting two new pairs of glasses then, or if we'll have to give back the really cute blue ones. I hope we can keep them since we now have no more pairs of backup glasses left!!! In April, he will be able to get yet another pair of new glasses through the insurance company and a new eye exam.

He first got glasses at 18 months. I noticed that no matter where I brought him, or what I showed him, he never seemed interested in anything. He was developing very slowly and was very far behind, but when he finally started pulling himself up, he would stare at the TV when he was right in front of it.

We'd been to every specialist you can think of, and they all (including the neurologist) assured me that he could see just fine. I thought it couldn't hurt to bring him to one more doctor, so I brought him to an ophthalmologist.

I was so curious about how they would test a non-verbal baby to see if he could see. They had me sit him on my lap, and had a dancing Elmo toy on the other side of the room. My son showed no response to the toy, and so the doctor started to put other toys closer and move them around, and again, my son showed no interest.

The next test was a refractive test. They put drops into my son's eyes to dilate the pupils. Usually this bothers children because it blurs the vision significantly. Other than hating to have the drops put in, it didn't bother my son or affect his behavior at all. That was an odd sign. The doctor then gave the drops a chance to work, and then used an ophthalmascope (which is a handheld light with a magnifying glass on it used to look at the eye). The light is supposed to be refracted, or bent a certain way by the lens of the eye so that the light is reflected on a certain location on the retina. The doctor then began placing lenses between the scope and my son's eye until the light refracted correctly. She proceeded to tell me that he was practically blind, that his vision would never improve, and could probably not be corrected surgically.

So, we went to have glasses made at the local optometrist's office. When we put the glasses on my son for the first time, he saw himself in the mirror and smiled. I took him outside, and it was Christmastime, so there were lights everywhere, and he just couldn't stop looking around. Then I brought him to a local variety store, and he was touching and looking at everything. I was so moved. I KNEW there was something wrong, and I was right. He's done so much better since he's had his glasses, and I'm so pleased that he had at least one problem that was easy to correct.