About two weeks before Theo's aneurysm repair surgery I noticed that sometimes his left eye would wander laterally. It happened so infrequently that I didn't think much of it. Then a week before his surgery, my dad mentioned it to me. It reminded me of a two week period when Theo was three months old and his eyes were doing all kinds of crazy things. During that time we saw Dr. Steve who assured me it was normal and Theo's eyes looked great. But during Theo's hospital stay, Dr. Lin asked me if we had seen our eye doctor lately because he was concerned about Theo's wandering left eye. I told him we had a check up in April, but I would call and see if we could get an earlier appointment.
Now, just to be clear, Theo is able to make eye contact and hold it but once his eyes relax, his left eye will start to wander a little. If I called his name and get his attention, his eye would snap back into place and act normally.
I called Dr. Steve's office after we got home from the hospital and I told the nurse what was going on. She then relayed the message to Dr. Steve. The nurse told us that Dr. Steve was booked until April, but that he wanted us to come in for a quick check up.
On February 28th, Theo and I headed to the OSF Illinois Eye Center in Peoria to see Dr. Steve.
We first met with a nurse who did an exam of Theo's eyes. She noticed that he wasn't reacting to the bright light like he should and she was worried that he wasn't seeing the light. She then put drops in his eyes to dilate them and told us to go back to the waiting room for 30 minutes.
[Power nap!]
Of course, I started to freak out! Was my child going blind?! Why couldn't he see the light? What was going on?!
I called Josh who reminded me that Theo LOVES lights and is definitely able to make eye contact and that he was NOT going blind.
I calmed down and then we were called back into the exam room. Another doctor came in to do a quick exam (to measure how big his eyes had gotten) and then Dr. Steve and two others came in. I told Dr. Steve what was going on and that Theo recently had surgery, but that this was happening before that.
Dr. Steve then did his own exam and told me that everything looks great and that babies eyes will wander sometimes. BUT if it wanders and doesn't go back to normal or if anything else crazy happens I need to call him ASAP.
We then talked about Theo's procedure and I showed him pictures of the coils. He thought it was unbelievable that Dr. Fraser put in 78 feet of hair-thin platinum in Theo's aneurysm (frankly, I didn't believe it either, which is why I had the NP check the numbers THREE times!) and he said he was going to call Dr. Fraser and find out for himself. Of course, this was all in jest, but I love that Theo's doctors all know and respect each other.
As we were leaving, I asked Dr. Steve if we should keep Theo's appointment in April and he said he it would be a waste of time and we will just see him in August! Yay!
After we got home Theo was super fussy and didn't want to eat or sleep in his own crib so he took a nap on me. He did so great at the doctors office so I couldn't say no!
In other news, I have been pumping and feeding Theo for the last seven months. It was really hard and super time consuming. We were not able to get the whole breastfeeding thing down, so instead of going straight to formula, I decided to pump. I started out pumping 10 times a day, then dropped to eight, then to six, and finally to four. I was able to pump four times a day for a while (luckily I produce a lot of milk), but I decided that seven months was long enough. I'm sad and happy at the same time. I'm glad that I won't have to spend so much time pumping (20-25 minutes, up to 40 minutes) and cleaning all the parts. I know Theo likes the breastmilk more then the formula, but he will adjust fine.
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