New glasses

I should be better at this by now.

Zoe just went through quite the growth spurt. This led not just to outgrowing her pants, but apparently also to a significant prescription change for her astigmatism (from 0.75 to 1.75). And it means that her frames are no longer fitting her well. I’ve noticed that she’s been taking them off a lot more often recently, there’s red marks on her nose, and she’s said they hurt.

farewell to the "rainbow glasses"

I’m sad. I love those glasses, but they’ve lasted over 2 years, so we’ve definitely gotten our use out of them. And Zoe was pretty excited when I told her we’d look for new glasses. Though she’d never said anything about it before, she told me on Friday that she didn’t like people calling her glasses “rainbow glasses” and she wanted ones that were just one color, rather than multi-colored. Dots, stripes, or other patterns would be ok, though.

The last time we picked frames, Zoe had just turned 2. She was talking, but only a little, and rarely in public, so Chris and I did most of the picking. This time around, Zoe is 4 1/2, and definitely has some ideas about what she wants, and isn’t afraid to let everyone know. Before going to the glasses shop, I was pretty excited for her to pick her frames. But on our way to the shop and started having second thoughts. Zoe has her own sense of style, that’s for sure. But it can change day to day, and what if I hated her choice of glasses? We let her choose her outfits each day, but she’s choosing from clothes that we’ve bought, and her craziest outfits are only for one day. She is going to be wearing these glasses every single day. I know I recommend letting kids have a say in their glasses, but when it came down to it, I’ll admit, I was feeling a little hesitant. It’s much easier said than done.

Then we pulled up the the shop, and Chris turned to me and asked if I had the prescription. I think I stared at him blankly for a good 3 minutes as my mind furiously raced through the events of the previous day. I remember getting the prescription – heck, I remember the exact prescription – but I had no idea where it was. How could I forget to keep track of the prescription?!? I ran home to look for it (thank goodness we live near by) and finally thought to look in the bag of books and games we’d taken to the exam to entertain Zoe during the waits. By the time I got back to the shop, Chris and Zoe had narrowed the frames to ones that she liked, and thankfully, most were ones that I liked, too. There was one pair that was a bright pink that didn’t look good with her coloring. I tried to talk up the other frames, but she kept going back to those. And I just couldn’t stomach spending the money for frames that I really didn’t like on her face (they were cute, but not on her). So I went against my recommendations and pushed a bit harder for some of the other frames. The optician caught on, and had Zoe try a few more on while we moved the bright pink frames a little further away. She finally settled on a pale purple pair – that have lots of flecks of different shades of purple, and a second of dark brown frames.

The new glasses should be here in a week or so. I think Zoe was disappointed she couldn’t take them home that day. She’s planning to bring in the pictures of her in her new glasses to school tomorrow for show and tell.

these are actually much more purple in real life

the second pair

11 responses to “New glasses”

Love the new look. Sophisticated!

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I had done quite a bit of trimming before you got back. There were a number of pairs Zoe like that got eliminated before you saw the pile.

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Ann Z April 13, 2011 at 2:31 pm · · Reply →

Ah, I had wondered about that. It was a nice manageable-sized pile when I got there.

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Really love the second pair!!

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Hi Ann,
I LOVE both frames, but particularly the first colourful pair! They are a great fit and very fun. It is a big decision picking the right frames for children, particularly when they wear them all day every day. Great choice. She really looks adorable. It is interesting you mentioned Zoe having a large change in her astigmatism correction. I was just going to post a question about the same thing. We had Paris’s six monthly check up with the PO and he seemed to think her astigmatism as changed from 0.75 to 2.0 which is quite a big jump, the myopia has remained stable and he actually decreased her script from -5 to -4. However, because there was such a significant jump he asked us to come back and have Paris tested on the corneal topographer – a very sophisticated machine that takes detailed pictures of the cornea to triple check that it was in fact correct. We did that yesterday and are eagerly awaiting results today. He did say it was extremely difficult to get an exactly correct measurement in young children and particularly hard to determine the amount of astigmatism. I will let you know how we go. Did they use that machine for Zoe? and did they explain why there was a significant change?

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Ann Z April 15, 2011 at 4:05 am · · Reply →

Ingrid, that’s really interesting. I’m glad you did the follow up and have better information about Paris’s prescription. Our PO did not use a corneal topographer, I’ll ask about it at our follow up visit (a month after her new glasses come in). I do know that it was clear that she needed a change in her prescription, she was looking sideways through her glasses at the eye charts, apparently because when you look through the side of your glasses, you get a different prescription.

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Update! we got the results and Paris actually has only .5 astigmatism in her right eye! We are going again tomorrow for the PO to dilate her eyes again and be certain of the refractive error but now at least he knows he is not dealing with astigmatism. I am not looking forward to it as she only had the drops a week ago and it took three people to hold her down for them but I guess if it means getting the script as close to perfect as possible then it’s worth it. I just thought it was worth mentioning Ann because I guess specialists can and do still make mistakes or there can be error. Worth mentioning to your PO if they havent used the corneal topographer? Usually they do not use it on children as they often wont sit still enough but luckily Paris was able to!

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Zoe looks absolutely adorable in her new specs. I particularly love the first pair, the purple ones. What brand are they, if you don’t mind me asking?

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