Opthamology......

We took Rhett to see the opthamologist yesterday to have his eyes checked. Rhett suffers from Nystagmus, which is a condition where his eyes shake back and forth. He does not see the world shaking, although by looking at him you would surely think it.

It just makes things much harder to come into focus. Unfortunately you can't fix this by glasses. However he is far-sighted as well, and that can be fixed by glasses. I have been concerned for quite some time now, as Rhett has been squinting alot, and when something is on TV that he wants to watch he will squint for a minute, then get down and go stand up to the TV.

In fact if he is more than a foot away from the TV he shows no interest, nor does he acknowledge that it is on. The opthamologist was able to shed some light on this for us. With things not coming into focus Rhett has come up with his own solution of seeing things better......make it BIGGER......

This is fine, other than him standing so close to the TV is going to make his far-sightedness worse. Do you see where I am going here?

One solution is to make things bigger, but then him being so close is causing other issues. Everything we do with Rhett is always a very fine balancing act. This is just the latest addition to our three ring circus that we live every day.

Of course the opthamologist's simple solution to this is that we need to purchase a big screen television so that he could see without straining his eyes. Don't get me wrong, I am all for that. It would be great to have a big screen, and say hey, it was doctor's orders!! But meanwhile, back in the real world.........

There is no way we can make a purchase like that. Gone are the days that we had an extra couple of grand lying around to buy something like that. Wait.....I don't think we have ever had that much money. We thought of going to our local furniture store and financing one, however our credit is so bad due to loosing our home and all of the medical bills that are in collections. They would just laugh at us, and I would end up with that awkward feeling that I get so often when we are denied something.

I would like to think that one of these days we are going to turn a corner and get back on track financially. I don't understand how money can play such a huge factor in our lives. They always say that money isn't everything, but man it would be nice to have some once in a while.

We were saving for a bed for Andy and I, due to the fact that when we moved ours fell out of the back of the truck and became a big pile of firewood. We have been sleeping on a mattress on the floor. Not that I am complaining about it, Thank God we still have the mattress! But it would be nice to actually be able to get something for myself once in a while.

Anyways, due to the fact that I am not a doctor and cannot go out and purchase big ticket items we will not be doing anything but saving our pants off for a while until we can get this TV for Rhett.

I know a TV sounds superficial, but we have to play in the fact that it is a huge part to his development. We watch Signing Time many times throughout the day together, and he would not be where he is with his signs and his speech with out that and Sesame Street. I do not just plop him down in front of the TV. I sit down with him and interact. We do signs with Rachel Coleman, we work on his pointing skills by me asking him to point to Cookie Monster on Sesame Street, we sing songs with Elmo and we repeat the alphabet every time it comes on with emphasis on the sounds that each letter makes. We also watch a whole lot of CMT music videos and dance our pants off.

Am I being dumb taking this suggestion to heart? All I want to do is give Rhett every chance he can have to be successful in life, and so much of it has to be done while he is young.

For now they are not going to put him in glasses due to the fact that his far-sightedness is not so bad that putting glasses on him would make a huge difference, therefore he probably would not keep them on. We will just wait and see, and I will worry about him every time he stands up close to the TV.

We have been referred to the school for the blind in our state for his Nystagmus, and we will soon add a vision specialist to his plethora of therapists that he sees on a weekly basis.

On a brighter note though, the optic nerve thingy that they check for brain damage is nice and pink and in good condition. Which means from this standpoint he suffered no significant brain damage when he was overdosed. I had pretty much guessed that, but it's always good to have that confirmation.

Next week we see Neurology for the first time.....Maybe he will recommend that I need a big fat vacation to Tahiti.