I've been crazy blogger lately...so I've posted a million times since I told you to stay tuned for Kanyon's big change. Well.....today is the day!
Here is Kanyon on Sunday afternoon. His hair was LONG and CRAZY! He looked a little too much like Justin Bieber to me.
So I called my friend that usually cuts his hair and got a few pointers, verified that she was available to rescue us in case of disaster, plugged in the clippers and buzzed away!! The hardest part was keeping him still. We ended up with him sitting in Kory's lap on the front porch playing with the water hose. I DID NOT do great, but it's good enough for me. I'll keep practicing! Here he is AFTER: 
Ok Ok Ok that is a change, but that is not the big change. Here is the BIG change BEFORE:
And AFTER: 
pardon the Cheeto mouth. 
We get a lot of this: (reaching up to take them off)
He's really not as thrilled with them as he looks here!
Yes, klp has glasses now. We've known pretty much since he was born that he would eventually end up in glasses and in a way I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet. His vision has been a challenge from a lot of different angles for his whole life. He had ROP (a common condition for preemies) and it was corrected with laser surgery before he came home from the NICU (the surgery saves them from becoming blind....like Stevie Wonder, he had ROP because he was a preemie....but it guarantees partial vision loss). Then he had strabismus (eyes crossed too much) and had it repaired right before his first birthday. Before the strabismus correction he showed very little sign of seeing ANYTHING. We knew his eyes worked, but he didn't act like they did. After the surgery, he got way better as far as looking around at things. He is seen by a teacher for the visually impaired on a regular basis. We know that he can see, but there is some difficulty in the processing of what he sees. Basically you use your eyes and your brain to see and there is some (not a lot) break down in his brain with what he sees. Add in the fact that he has weaker eye muscles and that the CP makes it hard for him to use all of the muscles correctly and we've got for a pretty complex deal. He is also unable to converge. Which is when you bring his eyes together as things get closer (watch your finger all the way to your nose). SOOOO he turns his head to the side to only use one eye or he has to bring things right up to his face. If he doesn't compensate for the inability to converge, he sees double. That is super annoying I'm sure. He has some nystagmus which is when his eyes shake (another side effect from the neurological "insult" or trauma). This has gotten better with time, but is still present and another reason he usually turns his head to the side. They shake less that way. Up until about 6 months ago his actual prescription looked pretty good and there was no need for glasses. But now there is!! He's legally blind without them. I think the actual number is something like 20/200. He is nearsighted meaning he can't see things far away. But the good news is glasses can help with that. A lot of the other issues we are dealing with will never completely go away. Thankfully, there are lots of really educated people out there who tell us what to do to help his brain, eyes muscles, etc. learn to work together better. And of course glasses can FOR SURE help his vision. I can't help but think that this has to feel better to him. I think he will be seeing things that he's never been able to see before. We are hoping this will help him in lots of areas and give him a better view of his world. As for keeping them on?? When I asked the Dr. his answer was, "Good Luck!" Haha. He says eventually he'll figure out that he can see better when they're on and he will be Ok wearing them. We aren't really pushing it, we're just letting him wear them and then when he tries to take them off we give him a break and put them on again later. So far he'll wear them for maybe 5-10 minutes at a time. We'll get there.
The search for the perfect pair of glasses was short. We didn't have a lot to choose from and I wanted to get them from this certain place. So, it is what it is. And yes, they have a warranty if they break! They are really bendable and they hook around his ears to stay on.
I have a lot of feelings about this, but the main thing is that he really needs them and I'm so thankful we have them.
14 comments:
Lots of adjustments with the big change, but he looks absolutely adorable in them!
i think you did great on the haircut! my husband always tries to get me to cut his, but i'm too scared i'll make bald spots or something! haha!
kan looks ADORABLE in his glasses- i'm sure he will get used to them and will be amazed at what all he is seeing!
Oh my gosh, I LOVE his glasses! He looks so stinkin adorable. You did a good job on picking out the perfect glasses for him. I love just love him!
Also, great job on the haircut. I now know who to call when I have to give haircuts.
Jaymie - that's wonderful that they are able to fit him for glasses and help his vision. You are so right that it is a blessing that there are so many educated people out there. He looks just precious in them!
Jaymie, Kanyon looks great! Reminds me of Timmy when he was little!
I love following your blog and seeing what all your boys are doing. You have great kids.
Love you guys!
-Jaime Banks
What an adorable little man with his new haircut and rock'in glasses! I laughed when I saw your post today because we too, were at the eye doctor today. Sometimes our lives are so similar it is a bit eerie :). I love all your recent posts and the pics of K lov'in on Q in the exersaucer are SO PRECIOUS!!!
he is adorable and looks like a little man.
First of all, the haircut looks great! Trust me, there's no way you could ever do as bad a job on a haircut as we did with one of Gibson's. We scalped the poor child (& yes, I cried). (you can see the brutality of the whole haircut at http://thedyessfamily.blogspot.com/2007/07/bald-is-beautiful.html) Second, Kanyon looks so big in his glasses. I can't believe how big he is getting. I'm enjoying all the posts! You're super-woman for blogging so frequently with both kiddos!
I am lovin your bloggy-ness! You are a bloggin' fool! But of course you are when you have such precious subject matter! Holy Moly... he is ROCKIN the new 'do and specks!!! AWESOME! And I'm so happy they are able to do so much to help him... I'm constantly amazed at how God uses modern medicine to answer our prayers.
So, we got big stuff going on in my household too these days. I may have to call you and pick your brain about a few things soon. :)
LOVE YOU!
Love the haircut and his glasses! I work for an eye doc and it always thrills me to give kids glasses, they can finally see what they didn't know they where missing! Dr. McMillian (who I work for) is the same way! But it will take him a little time to adjust to his new glasses, not only wearing them but how he sees, soon he'll know how much easier it is to see with them on!
Funny tease with the haircut pictures! I love the way he looks in the glasses. My grandson just got glasses like these and they have made a huge difference for him. I hope Kanyon gets used to them quickly.
Kanyon looks SO CUTE in his glasses. And I love his haircut, too!
I'm a little behind on your updates so I am just now reading about Kanyon's vision and Layne had most of the some conditions. He had bilateral myopia (lazy eye), strabismus, could not converge well, tilted orturned his head to correct the double vision, and had 20/200 in one eye and 20/400 in the other!!! We didn't know until he was 5 bc he compensated so well and didn't have any other concerns that would make us look at vision any earlier!! My dad noticed things on the golf course and my mom noticed things while reading with him. I had noticed both but mostly I had noticed the strange head positions. However, I never related any of it to his vision!! By then he had trained his brain to ignore the weaker eye and so it was getting worse and worse!! The first dr we saw told us he was legally blind and needed to play video games with his stronger eye covered for four hours a day and if it didn't improve he would have to have surgery!!!! We randomly discovered that the eye dr at the Sherman wal-mart formerly had an eye therapy clinic and worked at the Paris wal-mart once a month!! He did all of the therapy check-ups and taught me to do the exercises with him at home!! He did some pretty intense eye therapy for about 6 months to strengthen muscles and retrain his brain to use the other eye again! Now he uses either glasses or contacts for a correted vision of 20/30 in both eyes!! And, he often sleeps in his glasses bc like your dr said once they figure out that they can see better without them they never want to take them off! I prefer the contacts but he doesn't so he only wears them for sports and school pictures!!!
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