Dr. Buckley said....

These are two STRONG eyes!

Yippee! We had a great visit to see Whit's boyfriend yesterday. (Even though we were in there for two hours...specialists.) Her vision is wonderful. She is 20/25 in both eyes. That's the best that she has EVER seen in her life. I was so thrilled to hear it.

When she looks far to her left, her right eye still doesn't go all the way, so he said we'll have to see what happens with those muscles over the next several months. Yikes--I took that to mean he is pondering yet another surgery, but I'm not going to stress over that yet.

So, the plan is to cut back on patching. He wants us to patch two hours a day every day instead of all day every other day. I'm still trying to figure out when will be the best time to do that. I don't want her to have to patch at school, so I think we'll try for after her nap. Here's my dilemma: I don't want to spend 5-10 minutes decorating patches that are only going to be worn for 2 hours! Time to simplify. I'm seeing lots of Hello Kitty and Dora patches in her future. I've gotten pretty fast at both of those.

Here are what might be some of the last elaborate patches
...if I can get away with it.

My little pony

Junior Asparagus and Laura Carrot

Bob the Tomato with Junior

We'll try the two-hour patching routine for the next three months and go back to see him in December.

Whitney's before and after pics--first surgery

As we prepare for another surgery for Whit, I've been thinking about all the changes she's had in her eyes since she was born. Poor little thing. I wonder what the world looks like through those eyes!

Here are the before and after pics from her first surgery. I hope to take some "before" pics again soon but it's a 4 person process and it hasn't worked out so far. (Whitney being the model, Andrew holding her head straight, Brandon getting her attention, and me taking the pics.)

Looking right

Before surgery..................After surgery

This is the most dramatic change since her first surgery. Her right eye could not move out at all. It couldn't move past her midline, so she would look cross-eyed every time she tried.

Looking left

Before surgery...................After surgery

This one isn't as dramatic of a change. Both eyes worked looking left before the surgery. In fact, I think it almost looks worse post-surgery. Her left eye seems to bulge a bit.

Headturn

Before surgery..................After surgery

This was also a pretty dramatic change. Before surgery, anytime she wanted to look straight, she had to turn her head to the right. I think it's actually pretty cute, but it could've led to neck and back problems in her future. Definitely a blessing to have it resolved.

The before pics were taken in Mar 2005(11 months old) and the after pics in Apr 2005(1 yr old). Her disorder is called Duane's Syndrome. And the first surgery she had was called a Vertical Rectus Transposition--they moved the two major vertical muscles that move her eye to compensate for lack of movement to the right.