My 5-year old son Declan has had glasses since he was just over 1 year old. I first noticed that something was wrong with his right eye when he was around 4 months old.
But I decided to live in denial rather than do anything about it, convincing myself that he was going to grow out of it. It’s scary to admit to yourself that something might be “wrong” with your child, and so I decided that if I didn’t say anything out loud, it wouldn’t be true. We were already dealing with the fact that Declan had plagiocephaly (flat head syndrome) and had to wear a helmet for a few months, I didn’t want to face anything else. Eventually, however, I mentioned something to my husband, and after a short period of us both trying to persuade each other that nothing was wrong, we decided to take him to an eye doctor.
It turns out he is super far sighted in his right eye (+6.25) and quite far sighted in his left eye (+3.50). As a result, whenever he tries to focus on something within a few feet of his face, his right eye disappears into his nose. We immediately ordered glasses! I was quite upset. One, that I had been ignoring something that I knew was an issue for several months, and two, that my kid was going to need glasses for the rest of his life. There is no history of poor eyesight on either side of our families, so I was trying to figure out what had caused this. I was convinced that the plagiocephaly had something to do with it even though the doctor told me it didn’t. It took me a while to work through all of my angst.
In addition to the glasses, we needed to strengthen his weaker right eye. We did this first by putting atropine eye drops into his good eye once a week. This would weaken/blur the vision in his better left eye, forcing him to work harder with his right, therefore strengthening the muscles. We would have to do this at night… creeping into his bedroom, holding him down, opening an eye, dropping the drop, and then running away in the hopes he would fall right back asleep. He always did, but this was extremely traumatic for my husband and me! I was convinced that the drops were making his eye turn worse rather than better too, so we eventually switched to using an eye patch for at least an hour every day. We proceeded with drops and/or patches for around three years.
The optometrist always asks if we have any problems with Declan wearing his glasses and we never, ever do! From day one, he has been happy to wear them and never takes them off himself. I think this is because his vision is so bad, poor guy, that even as a one year old he immediately recognized the benefits of wearing them. They have become such a part of him that he looks odd to me now when I see him without them. Orange has always been his favorite color and so naturally his glasses have always been orange. At some point on our journey (I forget when, exactly) the doctor determined that Declan needs even stronger lenses for reading and drawing, etc., so now he has bifocals, too! Crazy.
Shortly before his fifth birthday, we decided to upgrade from the indestructible bendy toddler glasses to big kid glasses (still with some orange!). This may have been presumptive on our part, since he’s broken them three times in the less than two months since we got them! But I love how he looks in these, too.
If you’ve never worn glasses yourself, the options when choosing them for a child can be overwhelming and shockingly expensive. Here are some tips from everything I’ve learned with Declan:
- Glasses from the optometrist are more expensive, yes, but check your warranties if you buy cheaper ones online! Our eye doctor offers a two year warranty that covers unlimited replacements for any kind of breakage or damage. The only thing it doesn’t cover is loss. If you have a crazy child like I do, you NEED THIS. In addition, Declan’s prescription is so strong and unique (with the bifocals), that many online retailers cannot fulfill it.
- Get polycarbonate lenses for children. These are more expensive but shatterproof. Our eye doctor requires these for all kids under the age of 18.
- One of the most expensive elements to kids eye glasses is photo-chromatic lenses that darken in the sunlight. I find it physically painful to add this cost each time, but since Declan absolutely has to wear his glasses 100% of the time, it’s essential. Especially in the high desert sunshine of eastern Idaho.
- Flexible, plastic frames with no metal parts are amazing for babies, toddlers, and young kids and come in a range of fun colors. Keep your kid in these for as long as possible!
- If you have to use eye patches, the company Ortopad makes ridiculously fun patches. You can get them on Amazon.
You can get your child’s eyes tested from as early as six months old. Even if you don’t see anything physically wrong like we did, I definitely recommend getting them checked. It’s amazing to me that they can effectively test a babies eyesight without any reliable feedback from the baby, but they can! In the last couple of years, my husband and I have started to wear glasses for reading and computer work, too. My poor daughter is quite upset that she doesn’t have glasses and keeps asking when she can get some. Unfortunately for her, however, she has great vision!
