Terabith Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 Both my kids and my husband have a cold. My 13 year old was complaining about her ears and nose being plugged up. "It's so annoying and disorienting. I can't tell where anything is and I keep bumping into stuff." What???? "You know, because you hear the vibrations bouncing off of things? I can't hear them, so I don't know where everything is." No, not really. Turns out that's why she hates sports with balls. Her eyes are too slow to find the ball, and the balls are too small for her to find them by hearing. She's worn glasses for years, but it's a relatively minor prescription. She had her eyes checked less than a month ago. She just...uses echolocation. I don't know whether to be disturbed or impressed. 8 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pen Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 4 minutes ago, Terabith said: Both my kids and my husband have a cold. My 13 year old was complaining about her ears and nose being plugged up. "It's so annoying and disorienting. I can't tell where anything is and I keep bumping into stuff." What???? "You know, because you hear the vibrations bouncing off of things? I can't hear them, so I don't know where everything is." No, not really. Turns out that's why she hates sports with balls. Her eyes are too slow to find the ball, and the balls are too small for her to find them by hearing. She's worn glasses for years, but it's a relatively minor prescription. She had her eyes checked less than a month ago. She just...uses echolocation. I don't know whether to be disturbed or impressed. Be impressed. There is a blind man who learned to use sound like that well enough to ride bikes etc. He then started teaching others to be able to do it. If your dd can, she has a possible career ahead. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaybee Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 I choose impressed! ? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terabith Posted September 7, 2018 Author Share Posted September 7, 2018 To be clear, I don't think she uses it as a primary sense. But I guess she relies upon it as a secondary sense pretty extensively. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 I'd be impressed and *also* get her checked out by a developmental optometrist. It sounds like her depth perception could use some help. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terabith Posted September 7, 2018 Author Share Posted September 7, 2018 Yeah....we know her depth perception could use work. It's a long saga, but we actually made the over two hour each way trip to Greensboro to do vision therapy once a month or so when she was seven. We did the homework pretty religiously, but in nine months, she had NO progress and had developed full on legit PTSD from the vision therapy. When at a re-check, the developmental optometrist told us she had made no progress, we said, "Look. This is seriously traumatic. It's not working, and she's genuinely traumatized. We're going to stop," he told us that if we quit, she would wind up in juvenile hall or prison. She still has ptsd flashbacks at the sound of a metronome. So...we know she has vision issues, but we're not doing vision therapy again. 1 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 (edited) 10 hours ago, Terabith said: Yeah....we know her depth perception could use work. It's a long saga, but we actually made the over two hour each way trip to Greensboro to do vision therapy once a month or so when she was seven. We did the homework pretty religiously, but in nine months, she had NO progress and had developed full on legit PTSD from the vision therapy. When at a re-check, the developmental optometrist told us she had made no progress, we said, "Look. This is seriously traumatic. It's not working, and she's genuinely traumatized. We're going to stop," he told us that if we quit, she would wind up in juvenile hall or prison. She still has ptsd flashbacks at the sound of a metronome. So...we know she has vision issues, but we're not doing vision therapy again. From your OP it sounded like you were thinking that needing glasses was the whole story. I'm so sorry that VT was traumatic for her--a good therapist would not have allowed that to happen (and would have noticed much earlier than 9 months in that no progress was being made), and a good developmental optometrist should know better than to make dire predictions about a kid's future due to uncorrected vision issues. Edited September 7, 2018 by EKS 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Innisfree Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 I vote impressed. Hope she feels better soon! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scrapbookbuzz Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 When she is old enough to drive, make sure whatever car she drives has blindspot mirrors. I wish I'd had those from the get-go! Those blindspot mirrors have helped me a GREAT deal in understanding the true space between my car and the one behind me, especially while parking! Definitely a blessing! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
klmama Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 I'm impressed, not only that she can do it but that she's aware of it. Does vision therapy always include a metronome? I have friends whose dc needed that, and the exercises she told me about just involved doing things with her eyes. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris in VA Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 My mom told me she has no depth perception (or very little--I'm not sure how you can have none). I thought I was ok, because during eye exams, when they show those 3D pictures, either the ones with the fly or the ones where one of the four circles is supposed to look raised, I can do them no problem. But then I found out that advertisers use colors to make print (like on magazine covers) either recede or pop out, and I realized I can't usually see that. Eyes are weird! We are a very visual society. Hope she feels better soon, and hope her vision either improves or she manages to continue to adapt to her unique way of negotiating the world! ❤️ 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 13 hours ago, Terabith said: We did the homework pretty religiously, but in nine months, she had NO progress and had developed full on legit PTSD from the vision therapy. I had vision therapy and no progress for consecutive two months would have been a red flag and changes would have been made. I started off with back to zero depth perception in college and after a year was close to normal range. My SIL’s twins benefited from eye patching for their strabismus when they were in 1st grade. Totally get the using hearing to compensate for sight part. I used math computation to figure out how to parallel park and back my driving instructor’s car into a parking lot when I was in college. His car was a hatchback, similar to the Toyota Matrix. I do play musical instruments by touch rather than sight. My sight reading was so bad I had large print versions and a little extra time during the sight reading segment of my pianoforte exams. I was obviously squinting. My husband drove a rental Toyota Corolla with an integrated backup camera in Toronto, Canada and we loved seeing the view when he backs the car into the lot. Our kids were impressed. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scarlett Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 I thought your subject was 'I am raising a brat'. I was thinking, 'aren't we all, aren't we all.' But then it didn't seem like something you would say so I had to click. Glad I did because I am seriously impressed! 2 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gaillardia Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 I was looking forward to seeing photos of your new pet bat. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
extendedforecast Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 That’s pretty cool. I didn’t know people could use sound like that. I thought you were going to say that your child is truly nocturnal. I have one like that unfortunately. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Innisfree Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 49 minutes ago, gaillardia said: I was looking forward to seeing photos of your new pet bat. Yep. There's a woman near us who does wildlife rehabilitation focusing on bats, so that's where my thoughts went too. Your actual situation is just as interesting in a different way! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted September 7, 2018 Share Posted September 7, 2018 56 minutes ago, gaillardia said: I was looking forward to seeing photos of your new pet bat. Two of my middle school classmates had a family of bats as their uninvited houseguests. It was fun to see photos of the bats on their Facebook pages. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terabith Posted September 7, 2018 Author Share Posted September 7, 2018 I have relatively little depth perception, too. My spatial skills suck, so she comes by it honestly. If we lived in an area where there were a bunch of vision therapists, I would try to find one who was a better fit. I think she could benefit. But it's tiring and frustrating work even without it being done poorly. I'd kept saying, "I don't think this is helping." It was just such a bad experience, that unless we move somewhere there are a bunch to choose from and one clicks, I probably will just suggest she lives with her visual weaknesses. I included the part about the glasses to indicate that we do have her eyes checked regularly, and it's not like she's Daredevil and developed this trick while completely blind. She's just got some astignmatism. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gaillardia Posted September 8, 2018 Share Posted September 8, 2018 That must be hard. Nobody better be thinking you're a slacker about her vision. Maybe eventually you will find the right specialist to help her so she doesn't have to use sonar. Wouldn't you think that would be a a specialty for some wonderful high-paying job? lol Bachelor's degree in science with echolation capabilities. Lifetime of experience needed. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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