A new way of looking at things

With all of the amazing progress that Pope has made in the last 9 months, it's easy to forget that Pope is, and always will be, a blind child. It's been easy to put his blindness on the back burner. For starters, Pope couldn't see anything at all when we brought him home in March. But thanks to the very skilled hands of Dr. Alex Levin at Wills Eye Hospital, Pope's vision was restored in one eye this past June. The important thing to remember is that his new vision isn't 20/20, it's more like 20/400 with his glasses. Without them, his vision is nothing more than light, color and motion. He can't see any details. Recently, Pope's TVI gave me the opportunity to try on goggles that simulated the way Pope sees the world. The right goggle was completely blacked out, since Pope does not have a right eye, the left goggle simulated 20/400 vision, probably what Pope might see on a good day, with his very thick glasses. The photos below demonstrate a scene with 20/20 vision and the same scene with 20/400 vision.

As you can imagine, the simulation experience was very eye opening (no pun intended!) It really helped me better understand why Pope does some of the things he does, like bringing objects and books very close to his eye.

Pope has learned the classroom and the house so well, that it's easy to forget that he really, really needs a cane when he's in an unfamiliar place. There have been many times, over the past several months, that Pope has fallen or run into something. Pope also has no depth perception and he can see nothing to the right of him, so we must constantly be looking out for that too.


It's been easy to overlook Pope's blindness because we've put so much into his other developmental delays. His speech is so far behind. He's social skills are way behind as well. But as he begins to talk and become more social, we need to face the fact that his vision will not change. It will never get any better than it is today. And Pope will have to learn to cope... we all will.