Yes, I know, I have not blogged in months and months. My excuse. Too busy. I literally have not stopped working in months. Which is a good thing, but I also feel bad about letting some things slip, like the blog. I liked keeping it up. I can't make any promises on keeping it up now either, but I do have a little story that needs recorded.
A couple of months ago Taten got his eyes tested at school and didn't do well. So the school sent home a form that I needed an eye doctor to sign saying that I had his eyes tested by a real doctor. Tate has flunked the eye exam at school before, but we didn't think anything of it because he was young and his teacher thought that the tester probably couldn't understand him due to his speech impediment that he had. So I let it go. This time I needed the signature and I was worried because he is totally understandable now. So I ran him out to good old Walmart to their eye department. A little disclosure here: if you go to the eye doctor at Walmart and like him I suggest you stop reading this post right now. You might be offended by the way I am about to talk about this man. Okay, you were warned... So we went to Walmart and had his eyes checked. Then the very impersonable doctor came in and said that he had to dialate Tate's eyes to see more. So Tate let him not knowing really what that was. It hurt Tate eyes so much and then he kept trying to rub his eyes and the doctor kept getting mad at him. It was a terrible experience. For the record, it is my motherly opinion that if you do not have the personality to deal with all kinds of people and children, then I don't care how smart you are - you should not be a doctor. I have figured that out in the past couple years. They really should have to take at least a whole semester on how to treat patients before they get to graduate and make big money being a doctor. Just my personal opinion. So back to the eyes. The doctor looks at them again and just looks up at me with no expression and says that Taten was born blind in his left eye and since I didn't catch it before he was two there was nothing that I could do about it. He said that his vision in his right eye was not great and that we needed to get Tate glasses to try and protect the little vision that he had left.
So I ordered glasses which had no prescription in his left eye because he said it wouldn't do any good, but made the right eye see well. We got home and poor Tate was miserable the rest of the night because of his dialated eyes. I got the kids to bed and cried and cried. I woke up the next day and got the kids to school and cried and cried. Cody made fun of me due to the fact that I was crying about something that actually happened 8 almost 9 years ago. He had a good point except that it makes a mother feel terrible knowing that her little boy who has already dealt with years of speech impediment problems and fine motor skill development issues has also been dealing with vision problems and I just didn't know anything about it. The good thing about this whole situation is that Tate had no clue he couldn't see either. He was born this way. So while crying I said a little prayer and I immediately received the answer that I needed. As a distraught mother I was not able to think clearly. The answer was always right there in front of me. I needed to call the FABULOUS Dr. Daynes. Just because some idiot told me that I couldn't do anything for Taten does not mean that I have to believe him and just sit back and do nothing about it. Just then, Cody called me and said that he and Dad had been talking and that they both thought that Tate needed to go to Dr. Daynes. Answer verified. So I immediately called and got Taten in to see him.
When I first explained the whole story to the wonderful doctor, he was mad that the other doctor just gave up. You never just give up. I agreed with him wholeheartedly. Tate really liked Dr. Daynes. Which was good because he needed to see that there were doctors out there with personality and that are willing to help you. The doctor at Walmart needs to retire and just sit around reading all day cuz that is all he is good for. I might actually tell him that if I ever see him again. Hope I never see that man again. Dr. Daynes had to also dialate Tate's eyes which was a nightmare. It took Cody and I and the doctor to hold Tate down to get those drops in his eyes. He was fighting so hard not to have that happen to him again. He sat so good the first time for the idiot doctor and it hurt him so bad that he was determined not to get it done again. We got the drops in his eyes. Later Tate admitted that they didn't hurt him at all. I was embarrassed that my child acted like that, but I have since realized that it was not his fault. It was the retarded doctor that traumatized him the first time he got dialated's fault. Tate came up to me one day out of the blue and said that the first doctor must have put the drops in wrong, cuz it hurt so bad and the second doctor did it and it didn't even hurt. I think that he felt bad about how he acted to.
Dr. Daynes did not find what he wanted to. There are several birth defects that cause a baby to be born blind. The good news was that Tate did not have any of those defects. The bad news was that Tate didn't have any of those known defects, so we didn't know how to treat him. We did find out that his right eyes vision was not as bad as we thought it was. That was a good thing. The other good thing was that Dr. Daynes said that you have until a child is 14 for their vision to stabilize. There was still time to fix Tate's vision. He told Tate that he would make him a deal and that he could play all the video games that he wants to for 2 hours a day as long as he wears an eye patch over his good eye. He then turned to me and laughed and said that he won't be able to see thing, but he can play all the video games he wants to. I agreed. Dr. Daynes also changed his prescription in his glasses so that there was a really heavy one in the left eye. It isn't going to hurt him to have a precription in that eye. It can't get any worse than it already is.
So we went home and changed his prescription and my little boy patched almost everyday. I have to give Tate credit. He is one determined little 8 year old boy. He has insisted since the start that he could see. He would come home from school and put that patch on without asking him to and time himself and it really was no work on my part. I know that he probably only did it so that he could play video games for hours a day, but I will take what I can get. The day that Taten got his glasses was so fun. He and I ran out and grabbed them at Walmart and on the way home he sat in the back seat and read out loud all of the business signs all along Overland Ave. He wasn't really talking to me and I don't think that he realized that he was even doing it. It made me cry a little bit. He had been down that road literally hundreds of times over his lifetime and never was able to see what all those signs said. He thought he could see, but he didn't know what truly SEEING really was. He can now SEE and read the signs.
We went back to Dr. Daynes last Thurs. after wearing the glasses and patching faithfully for eight weeks. It was a good day. Taten's vision was 40/200 when we were last checked. It is now 40/50!!! He is officially no longer blind. It dropped 150 points. I am not sure who was prouder Taten or Dr. Daynes. They were both pretty excited. Dr. Daynes said that it was like we just flipped a switch on. It was off and we just flipped it on. There is no medical explanation for what happened. It just happened. He also said that the doctor that had given up on Tate was wrong and that I should tell him that. I think that he was as mad at that dumb guy as I was. We have to keep patching and getting that eye stronger and we still do not know why it didn't work and so there is a chance that the eye could revert back, but I am not thinking about that right now. You really could not take away the joy that I had on Thurs. Taten can see. I don't even need an explanation.
I do know that with all the medical crap that has been thrown our families way these past few years, there are blessings that come from it. I would have never known Dr. Daynes had it not been for my palsy. I would have never gotten palsy had it not been for the M.R.S.A. My little boy would still be blind today if I had not contracted M.R.S.A. I know that we have received other blessings through our trials, but I think that they were a little less obvious and I kind of had to search for them. This one just hit me in the face and I am truly glad that it did. We will continue to see Dr. Daynes and I know that we are in good hands and that Tate will get his vision stabilized and get to see all there is to see in this world with both eyes. That is the story of our little miracle.
***On a side note. Cody has always made fun of how much I and Mom and Sarah like Dr. Daynes. After meeting him, Cody can't help but like him to! He tried not to like him, but he had no choice. It just happens. So if anyone needs a good eye surgeon, let me know. I can hook you up! :)
5 years ago
