So, the Freak Out Followup

Follow up to the optical freak out. Bob has - according to the second optometrist - Small-angle esotropia, intermittent at near but constant at a distance, causing amblyopia with crowding phenomenon. None of which comes up with a lot on Google, unfortunately. Essentially, his left eye is periodically a bit off-track, thus the "intermittent" which means that surgery won't fix it. He had his 6-week follow-up, and there was some improvement, so we're doing more eye exercises and will go back for another appointment at some point. Scarily, the doctor implied tht this could be a fairly long-term thing. God, I hope not. Adding 2 hours of eye exercises on top of the after-school French program and regular homework, plus time for playing and dinner, is trying to cram a lot into one day. Doesn't help that he's bored with most everything we've done, and is a master at stalling and misdirection. Bribing will only go so far, and threats don't do any good.

Freak out Follow Up

So, last time on the amazingly neglected blog, I was dealing with the Dali/Coin conundrum, and vision issues.

The Dali issue was not so traumatic as I expected.  That day turned out to be bicycle day at Summer Camp, and an extra half hour racing his friends around the parking lot meant that Bob didn't give a fig about missing Dali or the coins (whichever ended up being the actual program).

The eye issue is an ongoing thing.  Bob had a two-hour checkup with an optometrist who specializes in pediatric patients - which meant having his eyes dilated, and whatever the doctor used was heavy-duty stuff, because he was still dilated a week and a half later.  And that led to my mother worrying that his eyes were still dilated.  And yes, we called the doctor, who said "drop by" the office (which is a 40 minute drive, so "dropping by" isn't that convenient).  We dropped, occupied the waiting room chairs for 20 minutes, and an assistant took a 20-second look to tell us that it's fine and can take up to 10 days to go back to normal.  And why couldn't they mention the 10-day timeframe the first time around???  Who knows.

Long story short: Bob has, as far as the optometrist can tell, micro-strabisimus in his left eye, meaning the focus is a bit off or out of sync with the other eye.  She prescribed 2 hours of eye exercises a day - things like stringing beads, putting toothpicks into a straw, tracing things, etc.  That was easy to do before school started, but this week has been a mess.  Trying to fit this into the evening, along with dinner, homework, bedtime routines, and play time, is a serious headache.  I hope it gets better as we get the routine fine-tuned.  We go back for a follow-up in 5 weeks, and if this hasn't worked, I don't know what the next step is.  Google results mentioned surgery, but that was for cases caught a bit younger and suddenly - since Bob's vision last year was 20/20, I'm not sure how something sort of sudden compares to a case that may not have been so sudden.

Can I freak out now?

Tomorrow is El B's last day of kindergarten.  He's been sad for days, and I think I may have to schedule a little freak-out time for me.  He's loved this school (it's a preschool mostly, French-immersion, and this was their first year with a kindergarten class), he's learned insane amounts of French and loves his teacher.  This fall he'll be changing schools and starting all-day school, and he doesn't do transitions well.  (Neither do I, apparently.) 

At least he'll have summer camp with his current teacher, plus weekly get-togethers with some of the kids in his class.  And  hopefully a couple of his favorite classmates will be going to the same school we're sending him to. 


But for right now, I may need to freak just a bit.  I just have to find somewhere to send him while I have a little panic, because he's also a worrier.  Oy. 

I'm so not ready for him to be six, or in all-day school, or first grade.  The world really needs a pause button.