Liam has to wear an eye patch for 1-2 hours everyday for his esotropia (not a lazy eye as most people think...lazy eye is actually where the brain has shut off the vision pathway to the eye and the eye no longer functions properly and that isn't the case here...Liam still has vision, his eye just drifts in) . We are trying to get Liam's right eye to straighten out and focus better and to do so we have to patch his dominant eye and make him use his drifting eye more. I don't see much of a difference yet and I don't know how long you have to patch to be able to notice a difference, but so far...we got nothin'.
Anyway...I dread putting the patch on. No matter what type of patch I use, it sticks very well to Liam's skin. I have tried using Milk of Magnesia on his skin, letting that dry and then putting the patch on in order to have the patch come off with less trouble. But, no such luck for now. It doesn't seem to make a difference for Liam's skin.
I also have tried putting powder on the patch so it is less sticky. That doesn't seem to matter either. It still hurts him when I take it off. Or,I put on too much and it doesn't stick.
So, today, when I went to patch him, I wanted to make it less sticky for him somehow. Brilliant woman that I am, I placed the patch on my face thinking that it would be less sticky for him afterwards since it would have a bit of my makeup and skin oils on it.
Little did I know.
That patch hurt like crazy coming off! I couldn't believe how painful it was! It ripped off every little microscopic hair and pulled at my skin.
No wonder Liam cries everytime. It's painful pulling those things off!
Tonight, when it was time to remove his patch, I knew it would be better to go fast (you know, cuz of my earlier experience with it) and as I removed it I said Ouch! with each pull and tug. Liam was quite taken with that and it must have been enough of a distraction because he laughed each time I did it. Not one tear tonight.
I think I learned my lesson in all of this....Liam may have sensitive skin, but those patches are painful and removing them from your face is going to suck whether you have baby soft skin or not.
And that I should be thankful he has an eyebrow at all on that side of his head...
2 comments:
Poor little guy. Always sucks to see little ones in pain, but it's especially bad when they're too young to understand why you have to do it and appreciate the fact that it will do them good in the long run. Hope it works well enough to make the suffering worth it!
How many hours of patching per day? It took us about two months before we saw a difference. We have gone from 4 hours on one eye to 4 hours alternating eyes to 2 hours on one eye back to the original 4 hours.
I still suggest trying the Ortopad. They feel better (I tried them too and the other two brands). The offer still stand for me to send you a few. I have 2 big boxes. Email on yahoo and let me know.
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