Looking for Answers Regarding Faith's Vision

Today Faith had her annual eye appointment. Her special education teacher from school came along because she had some questions regarding Faith's vision. Larissa has noticed when working on reading with Faith in school that if there is a sentence of three words like:

The Big Ball

Faith will just pick out the word she knows and say that one. And if she knows all three words in the sentence she just looks and picks one but never says them in order from left to right.

Also, Faith's teacher said that when there are three lines of numbers like:

1  2  3
4  5  6
7  8  9

Faith can read them if Larissa is pointing to them individually, but Faith can't read the numbers from left to right without them being pointed to. She just zones in on one number and says the one that catches her attention.

I am so thankful for Faith's amazing special education teacher who goes out of her way to make sure Faith reaches her fullest potential.

I've noticed at home that when we're working on her sight word flashcards, Faith will just glance at a word then look away and says a word she knows, even if it isn't' the right word. Sometimes I have a hard time getting her to really look at the word and then say it.

Both Larissa and I feel that the comprehension is there - she knows all of her letters if she sees them one at a time. Sometimes at the clinic when we're taking the elevator she'll look at the big letter on the door and tell me what letter it is. She also knows all the sounds each letter makes. We worked with her a lot on this, and I am so proud of her that she knows her letters, sounds and even some of her numbers. The difficulty comes when she sees a group of letters or words together.

Her optometrist gave us the news that Faith's eyes remain stable. He feels that she can see clearly, and her right eye doesn't turn in like it used to during our pre-patching days. So, all that is good. Dr. Samson was encouraged to hear that when Faith drives her power chair at school, she is getting good at visually judging distances and knows when to stop or when to turn.

Regarding these new issues that have come up with reading he said he doesn't know what's going on for sure. It's either a developmental issue and she just isn't ready yet and doesn't have the attention span or her eye muscles aren't allowing her to go from left to right.

It's hard to comprehend this because when we read, it's something that seems so natural and we're not even aware that our eye muscles are working. But with Faith this could be an area of her brain that received some damage, and the nerves aren't allowing her muscles to do what they need to do in order to read.

It is a reality that some kids with cerebral palsy cannot read. But with Faith, since there are no definite answers, we have to keep working with her. The optometrist says that Larissa is already doing all of the right things - it just might be a matter of time.

I refuse to get discouraged about this. I have faith for Faith that someday she will be able to read. It may not be in our earthly timing but instead it will be in God's perfect timing.