Your Child May Need Glasses

Although children should get periodic examinations, a parent’s first real indication of an eye problem may be when the child fails a school eye exam or a teacher notices a possible vision problem. Straining to see the board from the back of the room or having difficulty reading may prompt the teacher to contact the parents.

Common vision problems include myopia (nearsightedness), hyperopia (farsightedness) and astigmatism, which may result in distorted vision. Those who are nearsighted have difficulty seeing distant objects. Objects that are close such as words on the page in a book may appear blurry to someone who is farsighted. They may also suffer from frequent headaches.

Children that have difficulty reading may be misdiagnosed as having a learning disability when they actually have a problem with their vision. Another problem we sometimes see in young children is strabismus, otherwise known as crossed eyes, a condition in which one or both eyes tend to point inward. Most of us will remember our mothers warning us not to cross our eyes when we were children. Wearing corrective lenses for a specified length of time usually corrects the problem of strabismus with no lasting effects.

Telling a child that he or she needs to wear glasses can be emotionally upsetting to some children. Most kids don’t want to wear glasses because they are afraid of the way the glasses will make them look. They think they will look stupid or ugly. Older kids worry that their friends will make fun of them and they worry that they will be less attractive to the opposite sex. Now that contact lenses are a popular replacement for eyeglasses, children that have vision problems that may require them to wear corrective lenses on a regular basis, do have other options.

Even with contacts, some people still prefer their glasses, myself included but that is usually not the case with teens and young adults. With younger children contacts may not be an option and the child may be upset about wearing glasses even if it is only for a short period of time or just for reading. Try to make your child feel positive about wearing glasses and explain the necessity of wearing glasses now in order to have better eyesight later.

It may also help to point out role models that the child admires that wear glasses such as actors, models, athletes and singers. This helps them to see that wearing glasses to correct less than perfect vision does not diminish being beautiful or popular.