Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel

Since she was three years old, Emily has worn eye glasses.  Infact, one of the ways I would tell people who was who with my twins is to say "Emily wears Eyeglasses.  E for Eyeglasses"  When she got her glasses her eye doctor explained that she does not have a vision problem, but that one of her eyes simply crosses and shuts off a certain part of her brain when it does.  This would happen often at that time.  He also explained that Emily had a 50% chance of outgrowing this problem when she as about 10 or 11 and a 50% chance that she would have to wear glasses or contacts for the remainder of her life.  She had to wear patches, drops in her strong eye to make it blurry so that her weak eye would get stronger.  She hated patches and the drops eventually started giving her headaches since it kept her eye dilated all the time.   

She started off with wire frames that had pieces that went behind her ears.  We hoped this would prevent an active 3 year old from them falling off her face and she step on them.  Mike and I have never worn glasses so we never really knew when to adjust her glasses (since she really didn't know how or when to tell us) until we would see her eyelashes curling up inside her lenses.  It was really bad!  A couple of years ago she decided she wanted a pair of plastic frames.  I had a good friend who wore the plastic frames and loved them.  We got her those and she was much happier.  She has her athletic glasses for softball and gymnastics and we don't know her without them. 

Two weeks ago she came home from her eye doctor appointment with a huge smile on her face.  Mike had taken her to the doctor.  She looked at me and Mike said something about "look at what is missing."  I looked at her and she was smiling just like this. The doctor told her she only has to wear glasses at school and when she is working on things that are up close.  If she is not focusing on something close up she does not have to wear them.  No more athletic glasses and no more glasses at home unless we are doing homework or working on the computer.  She is so excited!!  We go back again in a year and are hoping that at that point he will tell us that she does not have to wear them anymore.  Who knows--this may be something she will still always have to have, but at least it is not constant anymore.  Can't tell you how happy she is.  :)

Emily at three years old when she first got her glasses.