Eye update

We took Henry to the ophthalmologist yesterday. Originally we were told that it would be a very long time (i.e. April) before we would get in to see a pediatric ophthalmologist, but it turns out that was only true for the other guy. Good thing we asked around about other options. Anyway, Dr. Bonn confirmed what we pretty much already knew: Henry has strabismus and has also developed significant amblyopia in his left eye. The doctor prescribed a course of treatment that first involves a couple weeks of patching Henry's right eye for about 6 hours a day to force the left one to do the work of seeing again. This is supposed to help strengthen his vision and correct the amblyopia. We go back in about three weeks to see if there's been any improvement. Depending on how things are going, the next step would be to get him glasses. The glasses are supposed to prevent him from crossing his eyes by helping him focus. If his eyes don't straighten out with glasses, the next step is surgery to adjust the muscles that control the movement of his eyeball. If we're going that route, the surgery would be done by next summer.

So, that's where we're at. Now, about that eye patch. Eye patching and toddlers? Not a classic combination. I mean, right now Henry's prone to throwing a fit when we try to do something so banal as put his pants on in the morning. So you can imagine that he was not too psyched about wearing an eye patch. Our first attempt to put it on was a total failure. Tom held Henry's arms while I struggled to affix the patch while holding his head still (they work like a bandage). I got the thing on, but Henry immediately tore it off. We tried again, with the same result. Tom and I started wondering how in the hell we could make this treatment plan work. But after some Internet research on getting toddlers to go along with the patch, we tried again. First, Tom and I put eye patches on ourselves ("See, Mommy and Daddy wear patches--it must be totally cool!"). Then we put socks over Henry's hands, complete with masking tape around the wrists so he couldn't tear them off. Then we put the patch back on. Presto! He can't tear the patch off. And luckily he's into wearing mitts right now, so he didn't even mind the sock gloves too much. Our goal was to have him wear the patch for an hour. He ended up wearing it until bath time--the full 6-hour time period. I guess once he gets used to having it on, it doesn't bother him. We even took the gloves off after a few hours.

So we're off to a good start with it. We even took Henry out to the store today wearing his patch. Luckily he's way too young to be self-conscious about it. But for Tom and me it was a little tough to see the double-takes. We're used to people staring at Henry because he's so cute! Anyway, there are worse things, and as long as we can keep Henry wearing the damn thing, we're game. I just hope it does enough that we can avoid adding glasses (how we'll get him to wear those without completely trashing them, I do not know) and surgery to the mix.