Last night I went to a social event where we were all seated randomly and given conversation starters so we could get to know each other. One of them was “What is your pet peeve?” I didn’t share then, but I will now because it’s the reason I started this blog in the first place. My pet peeve is that binocular vision disorders affect at least 10% of the population of the WORLD and no one seems to know there is a cure!  Indeed, it seems we are oblivious that it’s even a problem at all!

I didn’t share last night because 1. The pet peeves people were sharing were things like “I hate it when my children read the paper over my shoulder. . . “ and 2. I had already shared the most brave thing I had ever done and it effectively killed the conversation so I didn’t feel like a repeat performance was in order.  What was my conversation killer? I gave birth to my last four children at home, by choice, with a midwife. Yeah, that choice seemed better than to risk birthing in the car while trying to get to the hospital in time.  So I chose to stay quiet yet again.

Monday I substituted in a 6^th grade classroom for the morning. A couple of the children approached my desk and one girl asked if I have a glass eye. I kindly explained that my eyes don’t focus together but that I am doing vision therapy to teach them how. She seemed apologetic that she had even asked, but this is not a new thing for me. It happens a good percentage of the time in elementary classrooms. Sometimes I just hear them talking to each other about it, and other times they actually ask me. I could have taken it to the next level and had a little mini-class on strabismus, but I refrained—again. Not sure why except that I haven’t enjoyed drawing attention to my issues. The more therapy I do without results, the harder it gets to share.

I could have also included my personal experience with my dad having a glass eye following cancer. It was difficult to tell his eye was not real. The prosthetic eye was painted by an artist and looked just like his other eye. The eye muscles performed the same way they did before, so the eyes actually moved together, giving a very normal appearance. People didn’t have a reason to ask if he had a glass eye, but the loss of vision was a difficult adjustment. Still, he didn’t complain, even when the cancer returned and claimed his life.

That would have been a little too much for the kids, but it certainly has shaped me and molded me into who I am today. I want to make him proud, so I press on.