Evie's Patch

A few months ago Dan and I noticed that Evelyn's right eye was starting to cross when she got tired or was looking in a certain direction. I mentioned it to her pediatrician at her 12 month appointment, but because it only happened a few times a day he said to keep an eye on it and we would see how she was at her 15 month appointment. Three weeks later and after no improvement I couldn't wait any longer, so I called the pediatrician and asked for a referral to an opthamologist. After evaluation and eye exams we thankfully found out that her eyes are healthy, but that the vision of both eyes are slightly different. This is causing her brain to "turn off" the weaker eye especially when she is tired and it starts to wander. This is known commonly as Lazy Eye. (My dad had this when he was younger and had to have it surgically corrected in his 20s.) The first intervention is for us to put a patch on her "good" eye for 90 minutes a day to strenghten her lazy eye. If this doesn't improve the situation, we will need to put her in glasses.

This hit me like a ton of bricks. Although I am so thankful that her eyes were otherwise healthy, it is so hard for me to think about putting my baby in glasses at such a young age. Her vision really doesn't need that much correction, it is more to even out the vision in both eyes. I will do whatever is needed to help her, but want the world to see my beautiful baby girl exactly the way I see her, and not only see glasses.

As you can see in the picture, she doesn't mind the patch at all. We've been back for a 3 week checkup and the doctor saw enough progress that she sent us home for another 3 weeks. She is hoping for 100% improvement by then. We have two more weeks until that appointment, and although I wouldn't say that I never see her eye wander, it is much less than it was. (Keep in mind, before we took her to the doctor we observed it 3-4 times a day for a few seconds each time.) I may see it wander once a day now when she's really tired.

Things like this are by far the hardest part of parenting. I can deal with behavior issues and sleep issues anytime, but my heart just aches at the possibility of something being wrong with my babies. I just continue to pray for strength to deal with whatever comes at us.