“Mommy, I can’t see my book at school”
This was the refrain my then six year-old daughter was fond of repeating. To be 100% honest, I thought she was seeking attention, but since my husband and I have been bringing our girls to the optometrist annually since they were toddlers, I just put her off until our next eye exam.
At her eye exam last summer, our optometrist surprised me by saying that although many kids do fake it at their eye exams (out of a desire to wear glasses), the eye doctors are able to pretty easily see through their acts and determine if they do indeed have a vision problem. He thought my daughter was possibly a little too keen to have a set of specs, but he also thought there was a good chance there really was a small vision problem lurking there, so he urged us to re-visit in six months.
Just before school started this year, our six months were up, and we dutifully headed back to the optometrist’s office. This time we saw a different doctor, a young woman who was particularly good with children and set my daughter at ease immediately. She gave her the regular work-up, and noticed several anomalies. First of all, it took Maddy longer than one might expect to identify the letters on the eye chart. She thought this might be due to the fact that she needed to work to focus on the letters, which took here eyes a few seconds. Secondly, Maddy regularly missed the middle letter(s) in the lists. For example: if this was the list:
A
E
R
F
D
Maddy would take just a little too long to start out, then she’d say “A…(long pause)…E…(long pause)…F…D” She didn’t get too many letters wrong, but it was painfully slow and she often missed those middle letters. Perplexing. She thought there was a possibility that Maddy needed glasses but because she was so young her eye muscles were able to focus (with effort) to compensate somewhat. She also asked if Maddy was having problems reading (YES!) because this can often be caused by undiagnosed vision problems. Who knew?
The optometrist recommended bringing her back in for a more thorough exam, where she would dilate her pupil with special eye drops. She wanted to eliminate the possibility that something else might be going on, and see if she could get to the bottom of the question of why she was so slow to read the letters out. And so, the following weekend we trooped back in for the follow-up visit and had the eye drops applied. Maddy wasn’t at all bothered by it, and was quite fascinated with looking at her big, black eyes in mirrors. She has very pale blue eyes so it was quite a contrast!
The exam was great, because it ruled out the possibility of something more serious going on with Maddy’s eyes. They were healthy and beautiful! And the optometrist was also able to determine that Maddy is slightly nearsighted, and needs a mild prescription. Turns out she was going to get those glasses after all!
So now she has two pairs of adorable glasses which she uses for all her up-close work like reading, writing, computers. She can also wear them for the rest of the day if she chooses to, but she only did that for the first few days! Now her glasses live in her school backpack and her teacher reminds her to take them out at the right times.
I’m so grateful that our optometrist took the extra steps to fully investigate her vision – after only two weeks her reading has begun to improve and even her printing has become much neater. It saddens me to think that there are possibly a lot of kids out there struggling in school needlessly, just because their parents haven’t thought to take them in for an eye exam. It’s free in most provinces, and takes only a short time out of your day. You could find out that the reason your little one isn’t reading (or doesn’t like it) is due to a vision problem, not a cognitive one!
Thanks to the Canadian Association of Optometrists Eye Health Month for providing the data and sponsoring this important blog series.
OMG! She looks so cute! I definitely need to remember to take my kids. They are still young but it is so important. Thanks for the reminder.
I totally lied to get my first pair of glasses…I thought I was a freak – never knew other kids did! my whole family wears glasses and I was the only one who didn’t….well that’s caught up to me and now I’m essentially blind…argh!
She looks so cute in her glasses! I will be interested to see if it helps her reading. Keep us posted.