Additional Needs

Taking After Mom

Posted by Brittney Baumgartner on 14th December 2020 Additional Needs, Advice & Support, Disabilities

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Do you remember being a child and going to get your eyes checked?

If you were anything like me, you begged for glasses; may have even faked a few letters wrong to try and sway the tests in your favor.

Well, if you are still anything like me now, twenty years later, you have found yourself with those said glasses and this time hating them!

I have always had great vision, until I had children.

I remember someone recommending that I go get my vision checked after I had my first born Oliver, because pregnancy and hormones can do a funny thing to your vision.

They sure weren’t wrong either.

Astigmatism and near-sighted vision, glasses have become my new fashion statement.

With Oliver having a VP shunt, it was always recommended that when he become of age, I should start getting his vision checked routinely.

Not only for his vision, but an ophthalmologist would be able to check the ventricular pressure and possibly even foresee any issues with his shunt and hydrocephalus.

So of course we started his visits when he came of age, and every year we kept up with them.

Recently, now that we are remote learning with his school, I had noticed him placing the iPad extremely close to try and read the print.

Mom instincts kicked in, and off I went to schedule an appointment.

This time around, it was actually a treat to see Oliver be able to read the large and smaller letters off the chart, and tell the ophthalmologist whether, “this one or that one” looked better.

A short while later, we found ourselves out of the exam room and in search of a new pair of glasses for Oliver. Reading glasses to be exact.

Just like his mom, slight astigmatism and actually the opposite with far-sightedness (which is still common with kids and lessens with age).

And you guessed it, just like his mom, Oliver was quite the excited one to find himself a pair of glasses.

Luckily, he only needs them for reading, and even more luck: his pressure and eye health checked out just fine!

We are new to the journey with glasses, and children are not forgiving to fragile things like lenses, so if you have any recommendations please leave a comment!

Until then, enjoy my little “Harry Potter” Oliver and his new set!