Who's Got Glasses, Too?

Benjamin!

Yes, it's true. Both my boys are now four-eyes. :) We took Jonathan in for his follow-up eye-doctor appointment earlier this month. We decided to take Benjamin in, too, just for a precautionary visit (thanks to some encouragement from friends). We didn't expect anything to come of it, but when he did the "routine" eye exam (pictures instead of letters), he didn't do so hot with the smallest pictures. The doctor dialated his eyes for a good look inside, and lo-and-behold, he has pretty bad astigmatism (plus some farsightedness in one eye and nearsightedness in the other. Strange.). The poor kid couldn't see so well and we didn't even know it! He never complained and had no obvious "symptoms"-- he didn't even squint to see things far away. I guess he just figured that's the way the world looked. Soon after the appointment, we got his glasses, and now he knows there's individual leaves on the trees. :) He is very proud of his glasses and, for the most part, loves wearing them. I think he looks incredibly handsome. And I'm so grateful we caught it now! Thanks again to my thoughtful friends for the encouragement and advice. :)

As for Jonathan... the glasses didn't improve his "lazy" eye at all. Which pretty much means he'll need eye-muscle surgery. Apparently, it's not a big deal-- a fairly routine surgery of detaching and re-attaching the eye-muscle-- but for a parent, the word "surgery" is always a bit scary, especially since he will need to be "put under" during it. I'm sure it will be fine... it's scheduled for the end of this month. But, naturally, I am a bit nervous.
Till then, we are trying patching his "good" eye to strengthen the "lazy" eye as much as possible to minimize the surgery. Jonathan is such an amazing kid. He was VERY resistant at first, but eventually learned to trust me that wearing the silly thing was important. Now, he wears it perfectly fine for the half-day he's supposed to. Honestly, it's a little miracle. I'm so proud of him. We have a pre-op appointment the week before the surgery to see if the patch has helped at all--- but so far, it hasn't seemed to help.
Despite all, I'm very grateful things are as good as they are. I'll certainly take vision issues over many other problems. And, again, I'm so grateful we can take essential steps to correcting their vision/eye problems now while they are both so trusting, adaptable, and not at all self-conscious. ;)