I nearly did a funky dance!
Yesterday, I took Adam for his follow up appointment with Dr. B. after we'd re-increased his steroid eye drops and started him on an oral steroid about one week earlier. Additionally, he'd been a champ wearing his eye patch for four to four and a half hours a day to deal with the amblyopia he'd developed in his right eye. We thought his eye looked marvelous but my heart was pitter-pattering with anticipation to see what Dr. B. would say. I worried about the "haze" he'd seen behind Adam's IOL the last time. I worried that we'd be stuck on steroids for the rest of his life in order to get his body to "accept" the implant.
We could not have gotten a better report. Dr. B. was so pleased with how Adam's eye looked - absolutely NO inflammatory response, NO haze behind the lense, as PERFECT vision-wise in his right eye as he can be without the aid of glasses (Dr. B. said it's time to get Adam some glasses so he can see clearly through that right eye; we'll add a corrective lens for the left eye after he's healed from his next surgery) - he paraded us down the hall after our appointment and called out to his associate - "Dr. G.! - grab a (insert medical device term here; I've no idea what it's called...let's call it an "eye-a-scope"), look at this little guy's eye! Remember how inflamed it was last week?! This is the power of oral steroids!!" I was practically skipping along beside him, chattering, "Yeah! Remember how awful he looked?! His eye looked terrible...he had that mean-looking rash on his forehead?!" I was grinning from ear to ear. Crazily enough, I was also excited that we determined that Adam is now nearly blind in his left eye.
This means we need to complete the lensectomy and IOL implant in that eye as soon as possible. We got scheduled for surgery while we were there and we're on the calendar for Monday, April 11th at 7:30 a.m. This is oh-so-much-better than 10:30 a.m. (the time of his first surgery) since Adam cannot eat at all when he wakes up and can only have water until 2 hours before the surgery. That does mean we need to be at the hospital at 5:30 in the morning but that's ok. Stu and I are used to getting up that early.
A couple things I wanted to remember about Adam at this age:
He has been totally day-potty trained for months now but still wears a Pull-Up to bed at night and soaks it in his sleep every night. Rarely, he still has accidents while he's napping.
He has decided that when he talks about himself and says "I'm doing this or that" that it makes perfect sense to tell us "You'm doing this or that" Cracks me up!
Recently he's developed a fear of public toilets. I think it's because he can't see them very well right now so he may be afraid of falling into them or something. Because of this fear, he could not make himself use the bathroom when Stu and I took the kids to Applebee's last Friday (to celebrate Adam's first day without his eye patch/shield). Instead, while I was holding him on my hip rushing to try to use the bathroom for the fourth time, he accidentally peed all down the both of us. You know you're a seasoned parent when being urinated on in a public eatery does not fluster you in the least. Nay - you just calmly, quickly walk back to your table and inform your spouse that your youngest has just lost his pee-pee holding battle down the front and side of you and he'll have to ask for your dinners to be packed up in to-go boxes. You also feel affirmed in your good parenting when your 5 and 6 year old don't bat an eye and just say, "Oh, ok, we can eat our restaurant food at home at our own table" and get their coats and hats back on to leave the restaurant after only having been there for about 20 minutes. We tipped our waitress, by the way!
We could not have gotten a better report. Dr. B. was so pleased with how Adam's eye looked - absolutely NO inflammatory response, NO haze behind the lense, as PERFECT vision-wise in his right eye as he can be without the aid of glasses (Dr. B. said it's time to get Adam some glasses so he can see clearly through that right eye; we'll add a corrective lens for the left eye after he's healed from his next surgery) - he paraded us down the hall after our appointment and called out to his associate - "Dr. G.! - grab a (insert medical device term here; I've no idea what it's called...let's call it an "eye-a-scope"), look at this little guy's eye! Remember how inflamed it was last week?! This is the power of oral steroids!!" I was practically skipping along beside him, chattering, "Yeah! Remember how awful he looked?! His eye looked terrible...he had that mean-looking rash on his forehead?!" I was grinning from ear to ear. Crazily enough, I was also excited that we determined that Adam is now nearly blind in his left eye.
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| Here's a good picture of Adam's beautiful, (still dilated) clear right eye and his hazy-as-all-get-out left eye. What a miracle that our little guy will not end up having these milky-looking pupils and be blind. Instead, he will be a cutie-pie, four-eye guy with wonderful sight! |
This means we need to complete the lensectomy and IOL implant in that eye as soon as possible. We got scheduled for surgery while we were there and we're on the calendar for Monday, April 11th at 7:30 a.m. This is oh-so-much-better than 10:30 a.m. (the time of his first surgery) since Adam cannot eat at all when he wakes up and can only have water until 2 hours before the surgery. That does mean we need to be at the hospital at 5:30 in the morning but that's ok. Stu and I are used to getting up that early.
A couple things I wanted to remember about Adam at this age:
He has been totally day-potty trained for months now but still wears a Pull-Up to bed at night and soaks it in his sleep every night. Rarely, he still has accidents while he's napping.
He has decided that when he talks about himself and says "I'm doing this or that" that it makes perfect sense to tell us "You'm doing this or that" Cracks me up!
Recently he's developed a fear of public toilets. I think it's because he can't see them very well right now so he may be afraid of falling into them or something. Because of this fear, he could not make himself use the bathroom when Stu and I took the kids to Applebee's last Friday (to celebrate Adam's first day without his eye patch/shield). Instead, while I was holding him on my hip rushing to try to use the bathroom for the fourth time, he accidentally peed all down the both of us. You know you're a seasoned parent when being urinated on in a public eatery does not fluster you in the least. Nay - you just calmly, quickly walk back to your table and inform your spouse that your youngest has just lost his pee-pee holding battle down the front and side of you and he'll have to ask for your dinners to be packed up in to-go boxes. You also feel affirmed in your good parenting when your 5 and 6 year old don't bat an eye and just say, "Oh, ok, we can eat our restaurant food at home at our own table" and get their coats and hats back on to leave the restaurant after only having been there for about 20 minutes. We tipped our waitress, by the way!
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