Eye Appointment

We have returned from Henry's eye appointment (note the time - we had an 8:30 AM appointment and we got home at 10:00 AM - way to go Children's Hospital!!!! We were impressed with their efficiency). Here is the update:

To start, we had a loooong night. Henry has spoiled us by being a good night sleeper for a long time (naps, as we all know, are a different story). Last night Henry decided to keep us on our toes by being up from 1 AM to 2 AM and then woke for the day at 4:45 AM. He was in some type of distress - we hope just teething related and not another ear infection. Motrin helped at the 1 AM wake up, but he was very unhappy from 4:45 until we got to the appointment. Needless to say, all 3 Powells were very tired when we arrived at Children's Hospital (and Henry's 1st nap is usually at 9 AM, so that added to the fun for him).

Oh yeah, and there is a snowstorm going on.

So, if you ever wondered, "How on earth can they check vision in infants?" this is how they do it - I held Henry in my lap while they held up various toys that moved, squeaked, made monkey sounds, etc. to see what he looked at and where his field of vision began and ended. To test his actual vision (as in, 20/20, etc. although they have no way of REALLY determining that at this age) they fliped over large cards that on one end had a series of black and white lines, and also had a tiny hole in the center. How does this work - I have NO CLUE, but various cards were flipped for Henry to look at. They also looked in his eyes with a light in a dark room (which can determine, among other things, if they have an eye tumor).

Henry was a decent sport throughout all of this - he got a little frustrated at times that all of these enticing toys were being held near him and he couldn't grab them, but other than that he was great. They took some digital pictures of him and he was quite the ham.

Then, they dialated his pupils with drops (he wasn't thrilled with this, but handled it OK) and we hung out in the waiting room for 30 minutes while waiting for them to work. After we went back in, the Dr. then proceeded to look in his eyes with the usual lenses, etc., you see when you go to the eye Dr.. At this point, Henry was DONE. He was exhausted and crabby and decided not to be cooperative. Therefore, I was instructed to pin his arms while Mike had to hold his head steady so she could look at him. Poor Henry - he was very unhappy and I felt terribly for him.

The good news - he appears to be 100% fine! No sign of a lazy eye (which can be inherited, so we were worried), vision appears normal, etc. The drooping eyelid on his left eye is apparently not really a drooping eyelid as normally defined, but is actually just some extra fat that he has above his eyelid that makes it appear as if it is drooping (if that makes sense). It is not interfering with his field of vision and she does not think it will get any worse. We are going back for another appointment in 4 months for them to follow up and make sure the "droop" isn't any worse, but she seemed very unconcerned.

Yeah!!!!

Almost the instant we strapped Henry in the stroller to walk out, he passed out. He was then VERY unhappy when he woke as we transferred him to the car, where he then passed out again, and was then VERY unhappy when he woke when we transferred him to his crib. He is now asleep, and I really really hope he takes a nice long nap - he needs it.

For the rest of the day his vision won't be very good (he will have trouble focusing because his pupils are dialated so much) so the Dr. said to expect him to be a little cranky all day because of this. It appears that we are getting quite a bit of snow, so we are looking at a "trapped inside" day. We are going to see how he sleeps the next few nights - if he keeps waking as much and being as upset we will take him into the pediatrician on Monday to check for an ear infection (teeth technically shouldn't be extremely disruptive to sleep for more than a night or two).

So, all in all it has been a LONG day already, but we are very glad that our little guy appears to be fine!