May 6
16m 17s
In this episode, I’m sharing a very real, very personal story about my daughter and what led me to take her to a developmental optometrist. As both a COTA and a mom, I always tell families “when in doubt, rule it out,” and this was one of those moments where I had to take my own advice.
I walk through what I started noticing at home, from how she was positioning her head while writing, to her difficulty with attention during fine motor tasks, to hesitations with sports and play. At first, it was easy to brush some of it off as personality or age, but the patterns kept showing up.
I share what our appointment actually looked like, what they were assessing, and the moment that really clicked for me when the doctor showed me what she might be seeing on a daily basis. It was one of those experiences where everything suddenly made more sense.
I also talk about the difference between visual acuity and how the eyes actually function together. Just because a child can “see” doesn’t mean their visual system is working efficiently. That was a big takeaway for me and something I think more families need to understand.
This episode is really about awareness. Ocular motor skills, accommodation, and visual processing play such a huge role in things like attention, behavior, reading, and overall development, and they’re often overlooked or mistaken for something else.
I also share how to know who to go to if you’re noticing similar concerns, what a developmental optometrist actually does, and why this can be such an important piece of the puzzle.
This is just the beginning of our journey, and I’ll continue to share updates as we learn more, especially if we move into vision therapy.
Thanks for listening 🩷 If this made you think about your own child’s vision in a new way, share it with someone who might need to hear this too.
LINKS
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All Things Sensory Episode #75 The Power of Vision Therapy with Dr. Ryan Johnson
https://harkla.co/blogs/podcast/75-the-power-of-vision-therapy
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