Ok, so most of you are probably aware that Wesleigh has a little problem with his eyes, but it dawned on me that some of you may be clueless as to why we see a pediatric opthomologist. So, I will try and start from the beginning to help those of you out. Wesleigh has what has been diagnosed as a Congenital Motor Nystagmus. What that means is he has rapid, involuntary eye movement that he has had from birth.
Around 2 months is when I started noticing that his eyes moved a LOT!! They would scan back and forth very very quickly. When changed pediatrician for our 4 month well child check up and that is when the doctor noticed it. Wesleigh wasn't tracking with his eyes at all. He was unable to focus on an object and watch it move without his eyes jumping all around. Both of his eyes ALWAYS did the same thing, and it was always side to side motion. Well, Dr. Bourland, our pediatrician was VERY worried, and she made us an appointment for the next day with a pediatric opthomologist. Let me just throw in there, that I had already spent many of hours on the internet researching rapid eye movement and had already diagnosed what was going on as nystagmus. I had read the good, the bad, and the ugly. So, when my pediatrician freaked out on me, it sent me into a tailspin. I was alone also...Jim and my parents were all gone somewhere, so I was in this alone during those 2 days. We saw the eye doctor, and recieved the official diagnosis of Congenital Motor Nystagmus, I had a lot of questions answered, but the biggest answer we got was...we will just have to wait and see what his eyes do with time. The nystagmus can be caused by a number of things...an optic nerve that is too short (this was ruled out during our first visit to the eye doctor)...nuerological conditions (the only way to tell if this is the case is to do an MRI...the doctor didn't want to do an MRI on a 4 month old, he really wanted to wait and watch Wesleigh and see if he showed any signs of developemental delays of any kind) So, as if all mommy's aren't paranoid about their babies meeting their developmental milestones on target, it made me even more paranoid...the other thing that can cause the nystagmus is just a plain ol' fluke! (meaning that they will NEVER know what caused it, it just happened...don't we all love those kinds of answers!!!!!)
Anyhoo, so we were on a wait and see kind of plan. Meanwhile, like I mentioned I had already devoured all the information I could find on the internet, and that can be a major double-edged sword!! I had to stop reading about it on the internet and trust that God had a plan for my little man's eyes and that no amount of worrying and crying about it would change a darn thing...and believe me, I had done my fair share of crying and worrying!!
Let me just add in here real quick that during our first appointment the doctor explained to me that even though Wesleigh's eyes moved very rapidly from side to side that his brain had learned to compensate for it and that he saw images "still" just as you and I do. The brain is so remarkable!!! You can develop a nystagmus after a traumatic injury to the brain, and it can be horribly debilitating, b/c everything in your world is constantly moving from side to side, but if it is all your brain has ever known, then the brain learns how to make it work!! The doctor used the analogy of the old camera that used to shake to take a picture, but they spit out a perfect still picture...that is what Wesleigh's eyes/brain work together to do.
So, over the next 6 weeks, his eyes improved dramatically!! They stopped "shaking" and moving as much and as rapidly. He was tracking very well, and was just making remarkable progress. I must mention that during this time he was also soaring above and beyond any and all developmental milestones. He was way way ahead of where he "should" have been. We went back to the eye doctor at the end of May for another check-up b/c due to some lovely insurance politics, we were going to have to switch eye doctors and I wanted to see the original doctor one last time to see if it was just my crazy opinion that we had improved leaps and bounds or if he agreed. Plus...with an eye doctor and a condition like this, he had already established a base line of what his eyes were doing 6 weeks ago, and to just start over with a new doctor was very very aggrivating!!! At that appointment in May, the doctor confirmed that it wasn't my crazy imagination and that his eyes had improved DRAMATICALLY!!! He was super pleased with the progress that his eyes were making and was also encouraged by Wesleigh's above target developmental skills...he felt like we were looking at a crazy fluke case of nystagmus, and that hopefully by the time he outgrew childhood, that he would outgrow most of the nystagmus as well. Well, as you can imagine I was estatic!!!!! Such a wonderful report!! So, we were released form that doctor's care and given our medical records and were scheduled to have a follow-up appointment with our new eye doctor in July!!!
Well....throughout the summer his eyes continued to improve, they still moved a lot more than "normal", but we were making progress!! He also continued to be a little over achiever when it came to developmental milestones, always going above and beyond!! I think it some ways this was God's way of helping me relax and know what my boy's brain and body are fine, he just has wobbly eyes!! :-)
So, in July we saw our new doctor for the first time. He confirmed the initial diagnosis and established his own baseline and also told us that he felt like Wesleigh could see just fine. I had already started feeling that way, b/c he had started eating finger foods and he could pick up a little cheerio with 2 fingers and put it in his mouth. If he wasn't seeing, then that wouldn't be possible!! So, we were to continue on with life and see the doctor again in 6 months.
During this time his eyes continued to make progress. New people we met actually didn't even notice that there was anything different about his eyes. There certainly is though...if you really look at them, they still move back and forth or scan a lot more than yours and mine do, but they are NOTHING like they were when he was 4 months old. His eyes still get really wobbly when he gets very tired, but for the most part he has been doing very well. Somewhere along the way, we started noticing that Wesleigh kind of looks at you out of the corner of his eyes...it is actually quite adorable, and very flirty! I had wondered if it wasn't something to do with his vision, but I didn't worry about it too much. At Wesleigh's 12 month well child check up with the pediatrician, she was a little concerned about his peripherial vision and the way he turned his head. I wasn't too concerned about the peripherial vision, b/c of his behavior. He doesn't run into things and is able to step over toys when walking or crawling, but once again we were on the wait and see track until we saw the eye doctor in January!!
Well, yesterday was our check-up at the eye doctor and we got a WONDERFUL report!! The doctor felt like his eyes have continued to improve, he noted that he thinks his vision is at least 20/60! However, we will not have anyway of confirming the true strength of his vision until he is older and can tell the doctor what he sees!! But for the meantime the doctor wasn't the least bit concerned about his ability to see and comprehend the world around him!!! He also noted the head turning/corner of the eye thing...and he confirmed my thoughts on it. It is what is called the "null point"...that is the point in which Wesleigh's eyes move the least! That is why he always looks that direction. His eyes harldy move at all in that spot. Now, you move to that same spot in the other direction and his eyes move the most...he demonstrated this by shining a light in his eyes and watching how they responded!! The doctor was not the least bit concerned by this, he was actually pleased to know that he had found the spot where he sees the abosolute best. He has no worries right now and thinks that Wesleigh is doing wonderfully!! He said we should keep on keeping on and come back to see him in another 6 months!!
So, he received a wonderful report, and I feel very very confident that he will continue to improve, and hopefully outgrow the wobbly eyes all together!!!!
On a side note, as the doctor was walking us out of the office, I asked him about Ethan, and the chances of Ethan having the same issues. He said that he does not feel that what Wesleigh has is genetic, so he doesn't think that Ethan has any more of a chance of having it as the next kid on the street!! So, we hope and pray that Ethan doesn't have to deal with the same wobbly eye issue, but if he does, we will take it one day at a time as we have with Wesleigh!!
So, now, everyone should be on the same page and up to speed on Wesleigh's eyes!!! Mostly, he just has beautiful, blue eyes that are gonna steal girls hearts someday!! They have certainly stole mine!!
Around 2 months is when I started noticing that his eyes moved a LOT!! They would scan back and forth very very quickly. When changed pediatrician for our 4 month well child check up and that is when the doctor noticed it. Wesleigh wasn't tracking with his eyes at all. He was unable to focus on an object and watch it move without his eyes jumping all around. Both of his eyes ALWAYS did the same thing, and it was always side to side motion. Well, Dr. Bourland, our pediatrician was VERY worried, and she made us an appointment for the next day with a pediatric opthomologist. Let me just throw in there, that I had already spent many of hours on the internet researching rapid eye movement and had already diagnosed what was going on as nystagmus. I had read the good, the bad, and the ugly. So, when my pediatrician freaked out on me, it sent me into a tailspin. I was alone also...Jim and my parents were all gone somewhere, so I was in this alone during those 2 days. We saw the eye doctor, and recieved the official diagnosis of Congenital Motor Nystagmus, I had a lot of questions answered, but the biggest answer we got was...we will just have to wait and see what his eyes do with time. The nystagmus can be caused by a number of things...an optic nerve that is too short (this was ruled out during our first visit to the eye doctor)...nuerological conditions (the only way to tell if this is the case is to do an MRI...the doctor didn't want to do an MRI on a 4 month old, he really wanted to wait and watch Wesleigh and see if he showed any signs of developemental delays of any kind) So, as if all mommy's aren't paranoid about their babies meeting their developmental milestones on target, it made me even more paranoid...the other thing that can cause the nystagmus is just a plain ol' fluke! (meaning that they will NEVER know what caused it, it just happened...don't we all love those kinds of answers!!!!!)
Anyhoo, so we were on a wait and see kind of plan. Meanwhile, like I mentioned I had already devoured all the information I could find on the internet, and that can be a major double-edged sword!! I had to stop reading about it on the internet and trust that God had a plan for my little man's eyes and that no amount of worrying and crying about it would change a darn thing...and believe me, I had done my fair share of crying and worrying!!
Let me just add in here real quick that during our first appointment the doctor explained to me that even though Wesleigh's eyes moved very rapidly from side to side that his brain had learned to compensate for it and that he saw images "still" just as you and I do. The brain is so remarkable!!! You can develop a nystagmus after a traumatic injury to the brain, and it can be horribly debilitating, b/c everything in your world is constantly moving from side to side, but if it is all your brain has ever known, then the brain learns how to make it work!! The doctor used the analogy of the old camera that used to shake to take a picture, but they spit out a perfect still picture...that is what Wesleigh's eyes/brain work together to do.
So, over the next 6 weeks, his eyes improved dramatically!! They stopped "shaking" and moving as much and as rapidly. He was tracking very well, and was just making remarkable progress. I must mention that during this time he was also soaring above and beyond any and all developmental milestones. He was way way ahead of where he "should" have been. We went back to the eye doctor at the end of May for another check-up b/c due to some lovely insurance politics, we were going to have to switch eye doctors and I wanted to see the original doctor one last time to see if it was just my crazy opinion that we had improved leaps and bounds or if he agreed. Plus...with an eye doctor and a condition like this, he had already established a base line of what his eyes were doing 6 weeks ago, and to just start over with a new doctor was very very aggrivating!!! At that appointment in May, the doctor confirmed that it wasn't my crazy imagination and that his eyes had improved DRAMATICALLY!!! He was super pleased with the progress that his eyes were making and was also encouraged by Wesleigh's above target developmental skills...he felt like we were looking at a crazy fluke case of nystagmus, and that hopefully by the time he outgrew childhood, that he would outgrow most of the nystagmus as well. Well, as you can imagine I was estatic!!!!! Such a wonderful report!! So, we were released form that doctor's care and given our medical records and were scheduled to have a follow-up appointment with our new eye doctor in July!!!
Well....throughout the summer his eyes continued to improve, they still moved a lot more than "normal", but we were making progress!! He also continued to be a little over achiever when it came to developmental milestones, always going above and beyond!! I think it some ways this was God's way of helping me relax and know what my boy's brain and body are fine, he just has wobbly eyes!! :-)
So, in July we saw our new doctor for the first time. He confirmed the initial diagnosis and established his own baseline and also told us that he felt like Wesleigh could see just fine. I had already started feeling that way, b/c he had started eating finger foods and he could pick up a little cheerio with 2 fingers and put it in his mouth. If he wasn't seeing, then that wouldn't be possible!! So, we were to continue on with life and see the doctor again in 6 months.
During this time his eyes continued to make progress. New people we met actually didn't even notice that there was anything different about his eyes. There certainly is though...if you really look at them, they still move back and forth or scan a lot more than yours and mine do, but they are NOTHING like they were when he was 4 months old. His eyes still get really wobbly when he gets very tired, but for the most part he has been doing very well. Somewhere along the way, we started noticing that Wesleigh kind of looks at you out of the corner of his eyes...it is actually quite adorable, and very flirty! I had wondered if it wasn't something to do with his vision, but I didn't worry about it too much. At Wesleigh's 12 month well child check up with the pediatrician, she was a little concerned about his peripherial vision and the way he turned his head. I wasn't too concerned about the peripherial vision, b/c of his behavior. He doesn't run into things and is able to step over toys when walking or crawling, but once again we were on the wait and see track until we saw the eye doctor in January!!
Well, yesterday was our check-up at the eye doctor and we got a WONDERFUL report!! The doctor felt like his eyes have continued to improve, he noted that he thinks his vision is at least 20/60! However, we will not have anyway of confirming the true strength of his vision until he is older and can tell the doctor what he sees!! But for the meantime the doctor wasn't the least bit concerned about his ability to see and comprehend the world around him!!! He also noted the head turning/corner of the eye thing...and he confirmed my thoughts on it. It is what is called the "null point"...that is the point in which Wesleigh's eyes move the least! That is why he always looks that direction. His eyes harldy move at all in that spot. Now, you move to that same spot in the other direction and his eyes move the most...he demonstrated this by shining a light in his eyes and watching how they responded!! The doctor was not the least bit concerned by this, he was actually pleased to know that he had found the spot where he sees the abosolute best. He has no worries right now and thinks that Wesleigh is doing wonderfully!! He said we should keep on keeping on and come back to see him in another 6 months!!
So, he received a wonderful report, and I feel very very confident that he will continue to improve, and hopefully outgrow the wobbly eyes all together!!!!
On a side note, as the doctor was walking us out of the office, I asked him about Ethan, and the chances of Ethan having the same issues. He said that he does not feel that what Wesleigh has is genetic, so he doesn't think that Ethan has any more of a chance of having it as the next kid on the street!! So, we hope and pray that Ethan doesn't have to deal with the same wobbly eye issue, but if he does, we will take it one day at a time as we have with Wesleigh!!
So, now, everyone should be on the same page and up to speed on Wesleigh's eyes!!! Mostly, he just has beautiful, blue eyes that are gonna steal girls hearts someday!! They have certainly stole mine!!
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Ok, so none of these pictures are new...I actually went back through the blog to snatch them...but they all show you exactly what I am talking about as to where he holds his eyes/head so that he can see the best!! Just looks like a cutie pie to me!! These pictures range over the past 6 months!
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