Vision Enhancement Clinic

Today, James had an appt at the Vision Enhancement Clinic in Springfield, MO. I'll give you a little background info. Since he came to live with us almost 2 years ago, he's been very behind in reading. By the end of second grade, we felt he was almost caught up. He struggled through third grade and was even on the honor roll one semester! We were so proud of him, but we felt like he still shouldn't be reading like he should. So, when he started 4th grade this year, it was apparent that his reading level was way below where it should be. After a rough 5 week progress report, we knew it was time to do something. I spoke to his teacher whom we love {Mrs. M} and told her all of the trouble we've been having at home with his homework. We generally work on homework 3-4 hours per night. James has trouble with getting his numbers transposed and he also guesses words a lot by looking at the first few letters. He complains of headaches and his eyes getting blurry. I told Mrs. M all of his symptoms and she consulted the school counselor and referred us to the vision clinic.

Let me just tell you, I think our prayers have been answered in a way. Through all of the testing, the clinic found that James has severe focusing problems. He can see just fine far away and up close, but it's the in between that he has trouble with. The Dr. also said that his eyes do not move in sync like they should, but independently. He had to read a paragraph while a computer program monitored his eye movements. Most of the parameters were 2-3 times greater than they should be. She even played back his eye movements on screen and you can see why he has trouble by the way he reads the words. He looks at each word 3-4 times and goes back to a word even after he's said the word. It's hard to describe, but think of it as 2 steps back, 1 step forward. Luckily, he was prescribed glasses to help with his focusing issues and we pray that this will also help with his eye movements and word attack skills. We should get the glasses in about a week and then we'll have a follow up appt in 3-4 months to check his progress. Please pray that these glasses will help with strengthening his focus and helping his eyes work together.

On a more fun note, we ran by Bass Pro since we were just a couple of blocks away and then we went to eat at Lamberts {Home of the Throwed Rolls}. The first time we visited Lambert's, James called the rolls hot buns of steel. That still makes me laugh. Oh, how I love this kid!