Since September’s Avery’s eyes have been irritated more frequently than in the past and truthfully too often. Her eyes (usually the right and left at different times) would get irritated to the point that she would squint her eyes so much that they were barely open. We would usually end up taking the contact out and treating her irritated eye with Vigamox for three days as it often would stay red for an extended period if we didn’t do the Vigamox treatment. Meanwhile she would be without a contact (sometimes even two) for days at a time. This was problematic especially on days where she had pre-school or ballet. We were also finding that her eyes would often become irritated again within days after clearing up. While Avery does navigate fairly well even without her contacts in known spaces, she is for the most part navigating with her other senses. After visiting with Dr. Sideman and Dr. Ellis a few times, we came to the conclusion that the chronic irritation and redness may be a result of the contacts themselves. We tried a fresh pair but the irritation still continued even with the new pair. That left the doctors and us to realize the best course of action was to switch Avery from contacts to glasses as the irritation was likely being caused by a new intolerance to the contact lenses.
The process for prescription glasses has been a long one so far. Avery’s prescription is so strong (+19 in glasses) that some options that would have been available for standard prescriptions were not available to Avery. Since Avery is extremely light sensitive, we needed Rx sunglasses in addition to regular glasses. We were originally going to have Avery get transition lenses so that she would only require one pair of glasses; however, transition lenses aren’t available for her prescription. Thus we had to get two pairs of glasses….one for indoors and one for outdoors. We ordered Avery’s glasses two days before Christmas and to date received her Rx sunglasses one week ago, yet we still haven’t received her regular glasses. The process has been long – Avery’s strong prescription made the ordering processes including the options and the timing complex and long. For the past week Avery has been wearing her sunglasses all the time (even indoors) and she seems to be adjusting quite well. Her regular glasses are supposed to be ready by tomorrow (although we heard the same thing last week) and while I think it is going to take some initial adjustment as she has not been exposed to light without sunglasses for a few weeks straight, I’m hopeful that she is going to adjust well to her regular glasses. We ended up including a slight tint in her regular glasses so hopefully that will help with Avery’s light sensitivity some. Since Avery has been keeping her sunglasses on all the time (with the exception of sleeping and bathing), myself, Justin, or Karolin have been around to take her glasses for safekeeping. She knows she can see better with her glasses so I think she will take decent care of her glasses; however, she is only three and I am concerned with her accidently misplacing or being too rough with the glasses mostly when she switches from her regular glasses to sunglasses (i.e. when they go outside at school). Her teachers have been great and I’m sure they will try to keep a close eye on her; however, there are two teachers for 12 students, so there is only so much they can do. Speaking of Avery’s teachers (Ms. Kristen and Ms. Denise), they are wonderful. They have made some simple yet very helpful accommodations for Avery in coordination with her vision and occupational therapist (i.e. marking her coat and school bag spot with an blue “X”, providing her a copy of the book read during circle time for her to personally look at). Both Avery and Emerson love Ms. Kristen and Ms. Denise (and even Ms. Marnie). They love to play make believe at home and will often appoint themselves or someone else to be Ms. Kristen or Ms. Denise. We couldn’t be happier with VPC Pre-school. Anyway, back to Avery and her Rx sunglasses. Here she is!
It seriously so hard to believe you are nearing 18 months! I was so good with your baby book the first year as there was a page for each month; however, at the 12 month mark the standard updates by the book are less frequent, and I find that I’m not documenting as much as I should. So at 17 months, here is a snapshot of you!