I wanted to write up a post on the surgery – mostly writing out things that I had wanted to know before the surgery, just in case someone else is facing the prospect and is wondering what’s in store. Obviously, the surgery experience will differ for everyone, but there are certain to be commonalities. Apologies for such a long post, but I wanted to get all the details out.
Pre-Op
We were told by the eye institute to arrive at 5:30 AM for the 7:30 AM surgery. Our ophthalmologist’s assistant called the day before to confirm the surgery and when I told her we’d be there at 5:30, she said, “what?! Who told you to come that early? You don’t need to be there until 6 at the earliest.” We weren’t sure who to believe, so we split the difference and arrived about 5:45 AM. I had been worried about keeping Zoe from eating or drinking before the surgery, but it turns out that the new places and people and toys kept her distracted enough that she never asked for either. We also brought a whole lot of toys with us to keep her entertained, but it turned out that the institute had bins full of toys in our waiting room, so we never pulled out any of her toys. The morning was pretty much a whole lot of waiting, punctuated by answering the same questions over and over (I do understand why this is). I would absolutely recommend bringing toys for distraction during the waiting, unless you know for sure that you’ll be somewhere with lots of toys.
During the wait, we met with admitting, nurses, the anesthesiologist, the ophthalmologist, and probably 5 other people that I can’t remember anymore.
Surgery
I had assumed that putting Zoe under anesthesia would be the hardest part, and the anesthesiologist didn’t disabuse me of that thought. He told us that it was very difficult to be with your child, as they’ll fight the mask and the anesthesia. Chris offered to go with Zoe for the anesthesia, and I’m glad he did. He went with the crew of doctors and nurses and was gone for about 15 minutes. His report was that it was really hard, but not as bad as he’d feared, and he was very glad he got to be there.
We waited another 35 minutes or so before a nurse stopped by to say they were done, it had gone well, and the opthalmologist would be out to see us shortly. As expected, we spoke with the ophthalmologist shortly thereafter. She was pleased with how the surgery went, and we would have a follow-up appointment with her the next day.
Post-Op
By far the worst part of the day was when we were brought back to the operating room to be with Zoe as she came out of surgery. First, I want to thank everyone who warned us about the tears with blood in them. She had that, and it was really hard to see, but made much easier because I was expecting it. Zoe did not come out of anesthesia well. She wasn’t truly awake, but was screaming and twisting and trying desperately to pull her IV out of her hand. The nurse with her was very reassuring, but no amount of reassurance makes that easy to deal with. There was no calming her or comforting her. We mostly just tried to hold her and keep her from pulling out the IV. After about 20 minutes, she finally fell into an exhausted sleep with wracking sobs. About 2 minutes later, she woke up a completely different child. She sat up on my lap, saw a packet of crackers on the table and said, “crackers?” We gave her a glass of watered-down juice first, which she sucked down really quickly, and then reiterated her request for crackers. She ate 8 crackers and drank 3 glasses of watered-down juice. During this time, we were visited by all the doctors and nurses one last time. They mentioned that a lot of children throw up on their first car ride home from surgery, but that she shouldn’t have any problems after that. Um. Thanks for the crackers and juice? (She was fine). We were released from the hospital and got to the car and realized it was only 10 AM. Probably the longest morning of my life so far.
Recovery
That first day of surgery, Zoe ate a bunch of crackers once she got home, and then took a really long nap. When she was awake and not stuffing her face, she was surprisingly cheerful. She was also not as steady on her feet as normal, and ended up falling down quite a bit. We were warned to keep her away from stairs and I’m glad we did.
Since then, she kind of alternated between good days, when she was her cheerful self, and days when she was clingy and grumpy. She’s definitely been more sensitive to bright lights. I’ve had to change her diaper in very low lighting first thing in the mornings because the light in her room was bothering her. She’s gotten acetaminophen most days, but usually only once or twice a day when she complains about “owie eyes.” We’re also making sure she has her glasses when we read books, even right before bed, since she can’t cross her eyes now to try to focus.
The biggest problem we’ve had is the eye ointment that we have to put in her eyes 3 times a day. I think if they were drops, it might be easier, but it’s a thick ointment that we put in the corner of her eyes. She’s gotten to the point now where she’ll give us the tube of ointment, take off her glasses, and sit in my lap, and then hide her face in my shoulder and fight me when I try to actually apply it. But it’s better than it had been the first couple of days.
We’ve all definitely noticed her eyes seeming straighter, though I’m not sure if she’s always using them together yet. She was much more daring at the playground the other day – climbing up ladders and rope ladders, and exploring parts of the playground that she hadn’t done before. It was actually a bit scary – in a good, my-daughter-is-growing-up kind of way. Our next ophthalmologist appointment is in 2 weeks.
For Little Eyes 
What a great recap- I’d have to say it was almost word for word the same for Braden- although fortunately he came out of the anesthesia better (not a whole lot- but he wasn’t trying to fight and pull the IV at least)
Thank you for sharing, it brought tears to my eyes thinking back to that day!
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I’m two days away from my daughters surgery for strabismus and I’ve been trying to avoid that were almost there, I get anxiety thinking of that day and I often wonder if it will all be worth it in the end. My daughter will turn two next month , and was diagnosed almost 6 months ago, thank you for writing this I feel like it’s helped me fully understand what’s going to happen, but mostly that I am not alone when it comes to being worried, I wanted to ask if the surgery went well for your child and if there was significant change I would dedinelty appreciate the feedback.
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I just want to thank you for writing all of this out. My daughter had surgery 9/4, and it went EXACTLY as you had written… she too had an awful time coming out of the anesthesia, but after falling asleep again, was pretty pleasant the second time she woke up. But I was well prepared from this site for the bloody tears, something I hadn’t heard about before here.
We had a difficult time with the ointment as well, and at our follow-up appointment her ophthalmologist gave us drops to use instead- these have been much better. We still have to hold her down to do it, and she still fights it and hates it, but as long as we can hold her head straight and get the drops in the inside corners, she will open her eyes after a second and blink the drops in. Much easier for us all, and her eyes are doing great! Thanks again for all the helpful info on this site!
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Thanks Keeley, I hope your daughter is continuing to recover well. I don’t know why they don’t just give the drops instead of the ointment in the first place. Really, who wants to have thick ointment in their eyes?
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Thank you so much for the surgery recap. Its so scary to think that my son MAY have to go through the surgery, but very comforting to know about it in detail from someone that has lived through it. Thanks for remembering his appointment scheduled for 9/11 to find out about the need for surgery on 9/19. Your website is awesome.
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yeah, we hated the ointment also!!! i never really knew how much was actually getting into her eyes and how much just sat on her eyelid. sadie was only 6 months when she had her surgery. waking up after the surgery was the hardest part. when the nurse finally gave her more pain medication she fell back asleep. when she woke up the 2nd time she was much better!!! her eyes were red for a couple of days. i can honestly say it was not near as bad as i had anticipated. she had her surgery one monday and by friday you could not tell she had anything done.
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I know you wrote this over a year ago so I hope somehow you get this. My son is 5 months and we were just told he will need surgery in a couple months. I’d love to talk to you about your experience. I’m freaking out to say the least!
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Hi Melissa! I absolutely remember the freaking out bit before the surgery. It’s hard knowing you’ll be putting your child through this, and not knowing how successful it will be. Please feel free to ask any questions or just vent about fears or concerns. I know there are some other readers who are facing surgery in the near future, too.
Zoe’s eyes have stayed straight in the year since her surgery. We are going in for an appointment on Friday, and I’m hoping that we’ll find that Zoe has gained some binocular vision.
Just as an aside, I get an email anytime someone leaves a comments anywhere on the blog.
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On 10/3/08 we were told my son would need surgery for strabismus. This was our fourth trip to the doctor after previously being told his eyes were fine and they couldn’t determine that his eyes were crossing. This time surgery was immediately recommended and therapies such as patching, eye glasses, exercises, etc. were discounted. It scares me to think of going this route when other options haven’t been pursued. Does anyone have some advice or opinions on this matter? I appreciate the blogs I have read so far, as they have given me a good idea of what we’ll possibly be dealing with in a month or so.
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Thank you so much. My son has been wearing glasses since 1 and is now 3 and facing surgery. This helped me so much to read this even though it was hard through the tears. Were you completely scared before surgery? I am feeling so scared for my little guy. He goes on the 24th and I have not told him yet. Should I prepare him ahead of time? Did you tell your daughter what was going on before the date? Thanks for all your postings. I am so glad I found this site.
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Hi Christine, I’m glad this was helpful. I was scared before the surgery. I ended up calling the ophthalmologist once just to calm myself down. We asked Zoe’s pediatrician when we went in for her pre-surgery check-up about what to tell her. She suggested that we go ahead and tell her the day before and the day of, but not much before then, because she probably wouldn’t remember. Basically, her advice was to tell Zoe enough to help her understand that we were taking her in to help her see better, so that she knew that this was not an accident and that we were in control (even though we weren’t) so that she would feel more secure. We told her that she would go to sleep and they would fix her eyes, though I don’t think she understood any of that. But she seemed pretty calm with all of the lead up to the surgery, which I think was in part due to us telling her about it, and acting calm – even though neither of us was.
Good luck on the 24th. I’ll be thinking about you guys. I hope it goes as well or better for you as it did for us.
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Thank you so much for posting this. My daughter will be 2 1/2 in Sept when she has her surgery. Her doctor is apparently fantastic, but doesn’t have the best bedside manner…or any for that matter. So, I’ve been scrambling to get information from any source that I can find. This was very helpful even though I’m tearing up as I write this.
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Hi Melinda, I’m glad this was helpful. Best of luck on your daughter’s surgery. Please let us know how it goes, and let me know if you have any other questions.
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Thank you for this article! We just found out my son has to have the surgery next month and I’m freaking out.
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My daughter is two and we are just in the early stages of diagnosis and determining what treatment route we will take. I was diagnosed with strabismus at age two as well, so I have spent a long time talking with my parents about their ecperiences with me and their decision to not do surgery. I’m in the middle of trying to Google my way to the right answer. My mom has pointed out the the surgical procedure has come a long way in the past 30 years, but I am still so uncertain. As superficial as it may sound, I really don’t want my little girl to have to spend her childhood wearing a high-plus lens and eyepatches. I wouldn’t feel so strongly about it if I hadn’t lived through it myslf. My main concern right now is whether or not the surgery will work. I don’t want to put her through all that only to have to wear the same glasses she would without it. As an adult, I wear contacts which basically corrects the problem, so I would think that she could get to that point someday as well. I’m really a wreck about this. I just look at her and want to cry. I was so worried that this might be passed down to my children, but my older daughter has perfect eye health, so I thought I was in the clear. Either way, I know we need to act quickly. I’m wondering if there is any truth to what I’ve read about the critical period being less than age two?
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Hi Stacy, and welcome. I’m so sorry you’re dealing with this and facing surgery. I think it is worth noting that the surgery will not remove the need for glasses. In fact, if your daughter’s eyes are straightened with glasses, then surgery is definitely not recommended. All the surgery does is change the eye muscles to align the eyes, but it doesn’t do anything to correct the farsightedness.
There’s been a lot of research, and it does seem to be the case that earlier surgeries are more successful, but I would caution against rushing into it. I think the drawbacks of unnecessary surgery outweigh the positives of earlier surgery. Not that you should wait a year to make a decision, but I would talk to your daughter’s eye doctor about whether the surgery is necessary, or whether glasses alone would be treatment enough, and possibly get a second opinion, depending on how comfortable you are with your eye doctor. Zoe’s surgery has been successful, though she still wears glasses, I am happy that we had the surgery for Zoe, I think it was the right choice in our case, but I truly believe that surgery should not be the first choice of treatments.
Best of luck
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Hi Stacy,
I second Ann’s opinion. Though surgery in the general sense is safe, and will likely correct the alignment/muscle issue, it certainly warrants careful consideration with your Opth. and a second opinion where appropriate, particularly where the eyes are straightened with glasses. The need for glasses/patching will remain though, post surgery. As far as the glasses/patching…in my opinion..children that age only see them as a curiosity initially to understand and explore…they quickly become part of the norm. My son is in glasses/patching since 6 months, now nearly 5, it is part of the day to day.
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Stacy, is it if you wear the contact lens then your eyes are not crossing? If so, it would cure cross-eye problem without surgery. Isn’t it? I have a question. Does you see double if your eyes cross? My son sees double if his left eye crosses inward. Please reply.
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My son is 14 months and just had his eyes examined. His left one crosses bad and we found out he is very far-sighted. His doctor is hoping the glasses will help the weak muscles, but said my sons brain may have already programed his muscles to stay that way. The doctor brought up surgery and I freaked out. Since the eye appointment, thoughts have been racing through my mind, ” did I do something during my pregnancy that helped contribute to this?” “how do children react to surgery at such a young age?” “is it the best decision to make?”. After reading this “step-by-step” process, it has calmed my nerves a bit, but I still cant wrap my brain around the fact that my little boy may need surgery. It is good to know I am not the only one out there that deals with this.
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I can’t tell you how happy I am to have found this blog post. My son is 22m old and his left eye started turning inward about 5m ago. We met with the opthamologist about a month and a half ago and he has been wearing glasses since then. His vision is perfect for his age but they wanted to try the glasses first to see if there was any change. We just had our follow up appt today and they are booking him in for surgery. They said the glasses haven’t helped so surgery is our only option. So here I am, searching for comfort on the internet (hahaha) and I came across your post. I cryed through the whole story but I’m glad I found it. The more I know, the easier it will be.
I would love to hear how your daughter is doing today and what your thoughts are looking back on the process. 🙂
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Hi Kristy, Zoe is doing well. Her eyes have stayed straight since the surgery. She did start to develop amblyopia (loss of vision in one eye) about a year ago, and so we did patching for a few months and it seems to have resolved it. At her last appointment a couple of weeks ago, she was using her eyes together somewhat – she passed some, but not all, of the stereovision tests. But given that her eyes were not working together at all before the surgery, I’m pleased.
She does still wear glasses. For her, the glasses corrected part of the eye turn, but not all of it. Up until just recently, her eyes still turned in when you took off her glasses, but as her eye muscles have gotten stronger, she’s better able to keep them straight without glasses. She’ll still probably always need glasses for farsightedness, though.
So I’m happy with our decision to have the surgery and pleased with the results. Surgery was definitely not our first choice, but for Zoe, it was the right choice.
Good luck with your son!
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I am so glad I stumbled across this blog because I am so scared to have to have my son go through this. He has his appt. on 3-17-12 but along with the eye surgery he has to have his hernia in his belly button done all at once. I was never told that he would have bloody tears so I am glad to read that and now I can prepare myself for this. I did read somewhere while trying to find out more info on this surgery that they eyes swell shut for 3 days and the face is bruised and their eyes are blood red. Is any of this true? I feel like I am having panic attacks over him having to go through this. Thank you again for your post
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Angie, I definitely know some of the anxiety you’re facing. In answer to your last questions, I haven’t heard stories of kid’s eyes being swollen shut or facial bruising. Most cases I’ve read, the kids are up and playing again that am day. He will have bloodshot eyes for a few days, bu there shouldn’t be bruising on his face.
Good luck, I hope it goes well!
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Hi Ann, my name is Kalyan and my son has Esotropia strabismus with near-sighted. His eyes crossed at the age of 4 once, then it happened again after a year and cultivated nearsighted. So, the Ophthalmologist prescribed the glass (-2 in each eye) in 2010. After wearing the glass, his left eye started inward turn constantly. Since Apr. 2011, his left eye constantly turning inward even if he wears the glass or not. For the last 8 months, we are practicing vision therapy. Though it is not getting worse, the problem still exists. His problem is cross-eye with nearsighted. Doctors say it is a rare case. Did your daughter have nearsighted or farsighted? We need to decide if we want to go for surgery for him by this June. Your inputs would be helpful to us. Thanks.
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Kaylan, how frustrating for you both! My daughter is farsighted, so in that regard things were pretty straightforward. Is there any chance of getting a second opinion? On the one hand, you really want to do what you can to resolve this for your son, and it sounds like you’ve tried a lot of different treatments, so it may be that surgery is the right next step. What does your vision therapist say? Is there any chance of getting a second opinion?
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Thanks for your reply Ann. We have taken opinions from 3 Ophthalmologists and 3 vision therapists (they are optometrists too). Everyone suggested for surgery except for the last vision therapist. She asked us to start the vision therapy and we are continuing it for the last 8 months. It is not getting worse but surely no big improvement. It is confusing us; his age is 9 years already. We thought to try the vision therapy before deciding on surgery because we don’t need to regret later that we didn’t try other options. As I was reading Stacy’s points, she said that she wears contact lens to avoid her eyes crossing. What is ur opinion on contact lens? BTW, did your daughter see double when her eye crossed? My son sees double with cross-eye. 😦
What are other parents status after their kids surgery? I don’t see anyone posted their experience after their surgery in this forum.
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Wow, you’ve really been thorough! I think contacts depend on the child’s maturity. I’ve usually heard people say 11 years old for contacts, but I know some doctors will give younger children contacts if they feel the child is ready. I would think it would be an option.
I don’t know if Zoe saw double or not, she was less than 2 years old when she had surgery, and couldn’t really articulate what she was seeing. Her eyes have stayed straight since her surgery (she’s 5 1/2 now). She did start to develop amblyopia a year ago, but we caught it early and were able to treat it successfully with patching for a few months. She has some stereo vision and both of her eyes see well with her glasses. Until just recently, she did still cross her eyes when her glasses were off, but that was to be expected. She has recently started holding her eyes straight even without glasses, and her doctor thought that in a year we could start slowly reducing her prescription to see if a lower prescription will work for her.
Best of luck to you! From my perspective, it sounds like you’ve really tried to exhaust all your options, but if he’s still crossing his eyes and seeing double, it might be time to look at surgery.
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Ann, I forgot to tell my son’s age, he is 9 years old now and wearing a bi-focal glass as prescribed by his vision therapist & optometrist.
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Hi Ann,
Just stumbled onto your posting after doing a search. So glad to hear your daughter is doing well after surgery years later! My daughter Grace will be having surgery for strabismus (esotropia) in both eyes on June 12. She started turning in around 10 months and got glasses at 12 months. The glasses have helped but have not fully corrected her eye turns so the Dr. wants to do surgery. (she is now 19 months old) I am, of course, nervous about the impending surgery, but feel like this is really the best thing for her. I am curious if my daughter will need glasses after surgery. Her script is 3.75+ in both eyes right now. Did your daughter’s eye glass perscription change after surgery? Also, was there a problem with her rubbing or itching her eyes? I wonder if this is a problem with healing? On a side note, my 3 1/2 yo son also has stabismus and got glasses at 16 months old but so far his glasses have straightened his eyes out perfectly. I am amazed that both of my children have this, as there is no history in my family.
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Hi Erika! Your Grace’s story sounds so very similar to Zoe’s. The surgery was nearly 3 years ago now, and she still wears glasses. Prior to the surgery, we had tried a pretty strong prescription of +6. Shortly after the surgery, her prescription dropped because we had been overcorrecting, it’s now +4.75. Generally, the surgery does not remove the need for glasses, especially if the glasses help somewhat. Zoe’s PO only corrected the amount of strabismus that the glasses didn’t correct, so she was still crossing her eyes when she took off her glasses. That’s gotten a lot better in the last couple of months, with her eyes staying almost straight even without glasses. Her PO said that when she’s 6, we’ll start dropping her prescription to see what she tolerates, though she’ll probably will always need glasses.
I don’t remember her having any trouble with rubbing her eyes. I think I was told that rubbing their eyes it hurts enough that most kids only do it once and learn pretty quickly not to do it any more. The worst part for us was probably her coming out of anesthesia, and the eye ointment.
Good luck! Let us know how she does.
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Hi Ann,
Gracie had her surgery on 6-12 and she did great. By far the worst part of it all was coming out of anesthsia. She was cranky and pretty much out of it. After sleeping it off for 5 hours she woke up acting pretty much herself again. By the 2nd day, you wouldn’t know she had surgery (except for looking at her!) as she was acting completely normal. It has been 9 days since surgery and her eyes are straight so far. In fact, one eye is actually turning outward a little with glasses on so Dr wants us to keep glasses off and see what they do. We’ll probably need a weaker perscription but won’t know for sure until another 5 weeks. Just curious if your daughters eye(s) did this as well after surgery?
Thanks,
Erika
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I’m so happy to hear that it went well! Zoe’s eyes also drifted apart just a bit a few weeks after surgery, and we were able to drop her prescription which was fantastic.
Thanks for the update
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Thanks, Ann! I so appreciate the reply! Will let you know how it all goes next week!
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Hi, just found your blog while browsing around. My daughter Effie is 4 now and has been wearing glasses since her second birthday. She has accommodative esotropia that was corrected well initially until last november with glasses and some patching. She is now at a +12 rx and we have been patching longer with no improvement in the crossing WITH the glasses since nov. we absolutely adore our PO and he has mentioned surgery on our last 2 visits and we have our next f-up in 2 days at which time I really think that is the decision we will be making. I was curious about the procedure itself and that’s how I found your site and while it was informative, I did cry while reading it. At this point I am ready for her to have surgery since we are religious about glasses and patching with no improvement. I am happy reading that even without glasses there is some improvement now with your daughters crossing. I do understand that she will have to continue to wear glasses even after surgery, but I do get anxious worrying about “will she always have crossing?”. Thanks for your post!
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Julie, Zoe’s eyes continued to cross when her glasses were off for quite a while. It’s just been in the last 6 months or so that I’ve noticed her eyes staying straighter when we take off her glasses, they still cross, but not nearly as dramatically. Her PO said that’s expected as she gets older and gains more control over her eyes. I’m thrilled, as you might expect. I do have a lot of friends who have strabismus, and most of them say that they can keep their eyes straight as long as they’re not too tired.
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Ann, thank you SO much for creating this blog. My son is going to have strabismus surgery on 6/27. We always knew it was a possibility but hoped it would never come to that. Hunter has been wearing glasses for close to two years now and earlier on it seemed the glasses were helping. But then about 6 months ago, the situation completely turned and the eye glasses were no longer helping the way they needed to, and it was clear from two opinions that the eye glasses could not fix his condition. We are very nervous about the whole surgery, but know it is needed for him. I can’t tell you how thankful I am that I was introduced to this blog to help prepare us for surgery day, what’s to come and pre and post surgery. Thank you so much! Heidi
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Good luck, Heidi! I’ll be thinking of you and your son next week. I’m glad you found this blog. Let us know how it goes!
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At last, we have scheduled the Eye muscle surgery for our son on 07/18/2012 in the morning. Our Ophthalmologist said the surgery would be on both the eyes. We are hoping that everything would go fine. I have question. How can we find out the Ophthalmologist is a good surgeon? Do we have any website or any phone number to find out the rating of the Ophthalmologist surgeon? Please advice.
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Hi Kalyan, I’m not aware of any website that rates ophthalmologists. I would ask the doctor how many surgeries he or she has performed, and if there are any other ophthalmologists he or she would recommend.
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Hello Ann, Thanks for posting your experience. Its really helping us. My son, who is 2 yrs 4 months now have a cross eye. There was no cross till his 14th month. We have been to four pedioatric opthomologists and 3 of them suggested strabismus surgery. We are really worried and have few questions:
– Have you tried vision therapy before the surgery? OR surgery was your first choice?
– Its been almost 4 yrs since your kid had surgery. How is your kid doing now?
– Any suggestion for pre & post surgery for fast recovery?
As a parent, its really painful to see our child going through this tough time and appreciate if you can help with above questions.
Thanks in advance.
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Hi Ram, I completely understand the worry.
We did not do vision therapy, since Zoe was under 2 at the time, my understanding is that she was too young for vision therapy, so we didn’t really pursue it. I was unwilling to let her go for a few years with crossed eyes before she could start it. That said, surgery was NOT our first choice. If glasses alone (or with patching) had been able to keep her eyes straight, there’s no question we would have opted not to have the surgery.
Next month will be four years since the surgery, and Zoe’s done very well. She does have some stereovision and depth perception, and her eyes have stayed straight. She did develop amblyopia last year, we caught it early though, and it was resolved with 3 months of patching. Her eyes are getting stronger now, and are even staying straight without glasses. Her eye doctor said we’ll probably start decreasing her prescription in the next year or so, though she thinks Zoe will always need glasses.
For recovery, I think the important thing is to let him take it easy for a few days to recover, we kept Zoe home for the week after surgery. We didn’t really do anything in particular though in that week.
It is so hard to watch our children go through this. In our case, it’s absolutely true that it was harder on us than it was on Zoe. Best of luck to you and your son, and please keep us updated.
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thank you Ann for your quick reply Ann. Did Zoe had surgery on 2 eyes? reason for asking this is: though only one eye turns out for my kid, doctor says that we need to perform surgery on two eyes. Can you please reply.
thanks
Ram
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She did have surgery on both eyes. It looked like one eye turned more than the other, but I believe in reality, both were turning, which is why they operated on both eyes.
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We are going to have surgery for my son on July 18th. It is going to be in both the eyes. We are little nervous. Hope he would be fine after the surgery. Ram, we tried vision therapy almost for a year but no result so we are ended up in surgery now. His left eye turns inward. Hope his eye-crossing and double-vision would be corrected after the surgery.
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Kalyan, can you please post your experience of your sons surgery? my kid have to go through the surgery in 2nd week of August. appreciate if you can post your info.(pre & post surgery)
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Appreciate your reply Ann. Thank you.
Kalyan, please do post how it went after the surgery. Hopefully everything will be alright with your kid & wish you good luck. By the way where r u guys? We are in WA. My son had to go through the surgery some time soon. Hope for the best. Thanks
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Hi All, I am sorry for the delay response. My son had the eye muscle (strabismus) surgery on both his eyes on July 18, 2012. We were nervous. However, the Ophthalmologist was very cool and helpful. The surgery went for 1.20 hours more than expected, it seems his left eye muscle was more tighter. He woke up after 30 minutes and was restless. They gave him pain-killer and he went back to sleep. He was checked-out after 2 hours. The Doctor suggested us the steps to follow-up after reaching home. We gave him light food for 3 days and eye ointment/drops (antibiotics) 3 times a day as prescribed. We visited the Doctor next day post-op. He opened his eyes just 3 or 4 times for the 1st 3 days, it was watery and reddish. He had pain, irritation and itchiness. We didn’t force him. We applied drops for 10 days and gave tylenol/advil whenever he complained about pain. He opened his eyes fully after a week. The eyes are straight and he is able to see everything single; no double vision. It is still watery and could see redness in the night times before going to bed. He is staying back at home and just took him out couple of times with the sun-glasses. His eyes power is still -3 (20/60), there is power difference between 2 eyes. We have one more appointment after 10 days to check his eye power and the Doctor would prescribe the new glasses. We have one more challenge, we can’t use the maximum power glass for his eyes. We can use only the minimal power glass because his eyes started crossing when we used the exact powers earlier. So, we need to be careful now and we need to try the things slowly. Now, he is allowed to watch t.v./read books continuously for 15-20 minutes, then take some rest and watch for another 15/20 mins. As of now, we are happy that the surgery had corrected his crossing problem. However, we don’t want to conclude everything now. His school re-opens mid of Aug., we need to wait until he starts his schooling because only there he uses his full energy and we need to see how his eyes would behave when he uses his eyes fully.
Ram, I would say that you can go ahead with your son’s surgery. You would get good results. BTW, I live in Chicago area.
I want to Thank all of your support and information.
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Thanks for the update Kalyan! I’m so glad that your son’s surgery went well. Good luck with the beginning of school, I hope your son continues to do well.
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Thanks Ann. Hope my son’s eyes wouldn’t cross or see double vision again.
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Hi Kalyan
We are glad to hear that your son is doing well now. He will do better in coming years too. Thanks for posting all your experience. It was very helpful. My son has a surgery scheduled on Aug 6th. Hopefully everything goes well. Good luck & thank you very much.
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Thanks for all your wishes. Hope my son would continue to have good vision and no-more crossing / double-vision. I will pray for all you guys. Ram, All the Best and your kid should be fine after the surgery. Please update us after the surgery. God Bless All.
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