I can still remember the moment I realised I needed glasses. I had only gone to the optician’s appointment at school to get out of PE. ‘Cover your right eye with your hand and read the letters on the board,’ she told me. I think I got as far as the third row. I was 14 – goodness only knows how long I’d needed them for. As I told my parents afterwards, I thought everything was supposed to be blurred. Discovering just how clear everything could be was an absolute revelation.
It just goes to show the importance of getting kids’ eyes tested. It’s something we’ve done with No 1 Son ever since he was little, and now that it’s seen as cool to wear glasses, he actually couldn’t wait to get his first pair (his prescription is only -0.5, and as the optician said, he didn’t really *need* glasses, but he was insistent).
But I was different. I wanted contact lenses. I begged, pleaded and cajoled my parents for the next three years, before they finally relented and let me have lenses, and I’ve worn them ever since.
Obviously you can get eye tests for kids for free, so there’s really no excuse not to take them in on a Saturday morning or in the school holidays and have them checked out, just to be sure. The eye health pages at ACUVUE specifically recommend having a first vision test conducted for your child before he or she starts school, to pick up on any eye issues, however minor, which may affect their performance in the classroom.
If you do discover that your child needs some help with his or her vision, you’ll still have options to consider. Of course, there are always prescription glasses to consider (Boots have a good range). And if your kids are determined to wear contact lenses, well, my advice is to ask the optician what’s appropriate, and follow their advice. Unless you want a stroppy teenager on your hands 😉