Long and Winding Road

I have always described raising Travis as taking the long and winding road. We just did not know what to do and didn’t have any guidance. One of the reasons I am writing this blog is to try to straighten the path for others.

As I look back at the road we traveled, I now realize that as a parent of a child with special needs I wanted desperately to find a cause for his learning and behavioral problems so I could then find a cure.

And that is why I read everything I could get my hands on regarding every possible diagnosis and every possible treatment. I went to conferences and support groups. I met and talked to many people. And listened to many different stories and opinions.

And as you read our story you will hear our opinions. We decided for ourselves what paths along the road to take. And you should too. There are many paths available for kiddos with learning disabilities. Each child is different.

One of the many paths we considered to help Travis overcome his struggles with learning was a vision therapy program. I cannot remember exactly how, but somewhere along the way I heard about vision therapy and began my research. (As I have said before, I sure wish we had Google back then!)

I took a closer look. Because as many times before, and many more times still to come, I wondered if this could be a piece of the puzzle.

I read an article, “Vision, Learning and Dyslexia”, that was published in the Journal of the American Optometric Association in May of 1997. The article states, “Vision therapy does not directly treat learning disabilities or dyslexia. Vision therapy is a treatment to improve visual efficiency and visual processing, thereby allowing the person to be more responsive to educational instruction.”

One of the doctors that contributed to the article was actually located nearby. I had him perform a vision therapy evaluation for Travis. What could it hurt? (Besides our bank account?)

Based on the results of the evaluation the doctor determined that Travis could (not necessarily would) benefit from vision therapy. He projected that Travis would need eight months of therapy. At a cost of $3,200.00. On top of the price of the evaluation itself.

The therapy came in units of three months and consisted of eight weeks of combined home and office therapy, followed by four weeks of home review. The office portion was performed twice per week for forty-five minutes each visit. These visits were conducted by a vision therapist, (not the doctor himself), and a portion of these visits was spent teaching the parents how to perform the next home lesson.

The home vision therapy expectations stated that patients are to spend sixty minutes daily actively involved in vision therapy in ten minute intervals. Six sessions each day.

There are three times each day that are essential: before bedtime, and before and after breakfast. The other three times per day should be as consistent as possible in order to establish a pattern to follow on a daily basis.

As I reread the proposal I remember more clearly why we chose not to pursue this path for Travis.

Let’s do the math.

Over the eight months the vision therapist would work with Travis for 33 hours. And part of that time was to teach me how to work with him at home. During that same eight months we would be working with Travis for 224 hours.

And the home expectations. I was overwhelmed just thinking about what that would look like for Travis and our family. This would be difficult to require of any child. For Travis it would be excruciating. (And of course for me too.)

And the proposal also stated, “This time frame (eight months) is only a projection based upon the average time required to resolve problems of the same nature and degree as your diagnosis. The projected time frame, of course, will be influenced by your responsiveness to vision therapy, maintaining continuity of the program and patient compliance and involvement in the prescribed therapy regimen”.

This is the wording that to me says vision therapy may or may not work for you and if it doesn’t it was not our fault. Meeting the home expectations alone would be virtually impossible for the average family. Patients are destined to fail.

Before making such a large financial and time investment we would need a bit more assurance on the outcome. And we knew at this point in Travis’s life we would never be able to meet the expectations on the home portion of the therapy.

And my research at the time showed that while some doctors were strong advocates for vision therapy, others were not as convinced of the effectiveness and did not recommend it.

So today I decided to google it. Even though I know we made the right decision for our family, I am curious to know what is currently being said about vision therapy.

At www.allaboutvision.com they state, “The relationship between vision problems and learning disabilities is a hotly debated topic”.

At www.sciencebasedmedicine.org they state, “Dyslexia is not a problem with vision but with the brain’s processing of language. Attention deficit is a problem with the brain’s executive function. These are simply not problems with vision or visual processing”.

And I found a very interesting article on www.nytimes.com, “Concocting a Cure for Kids with Issues”, written by Judith Warner, in March of 2010. This article spoke to me.

Warner says, “If you’re the parent of a child who’s having trouble learning or behaving in school, you quickly find yourself confronted with a series of difficult choices. You can do nothing - and watch your child flounder while teachers register their disapproval. Or you can get help, which generally means, first, an expensive and time consuming evaluation, then more visits with more specialists, intensive tutoring, therapies, perhaps, or, as is often the case with attention issues, drugs”.

I felt like she had interviewed me for her article. Which tells me that there are a lot of families out there like ours. Wanting to help their child so badly that you may waste family time and resources on unproven therapies.

Because what if? And back then information and reviews were harder to come by. And some families reported it helped.

In Warner’s article she reminds parents that the American Academy of Pediatrics issued a statement condemning vision therapy and it’s contention that it could help with learning disabilities. And also issued a stern warning about the seductions of treatments that sound convincing but are not based on science.

I don't know when exactly that statement was issued, if it was before or after 2003, when we were looking at the possibility of vision therapy.

Ultimately we did not choose to move forward with vision therapy. But read my next blog to find out if we got duped on a treatment that we did try and whether or not if made a difference for Travis.

“The pathway forward isn’t always easy. At times the road is long and winding, filled with dips and turns around every corner. The climb is steeper than expected and dreams are oft times delayed. But this I know for certain: As long as I’m with you and you’re with me, we will arrive at our destiny together…and right on time.” - Fawn Weaver