Spencer's Eye

Strange things happen. Two Sundays ago I was sitting in church and noticed that Spencer had red in the corner of his eye. I was teaching Sharing Time and Evan was at home with a throwing up Camie. My first thought was, "man, Spencer has pink eye and I brought him to church, I don't have time to take him home and I didn't bring my cell phone to call Evan to come get him. Ahhhh! I don't have time for this!" I looked at it closer and decided I had no idea what it was, but it didn't look like pink eye. Danielle said she had been wrestling with Spencer the night before and accidentally hurt his eye. Solution to the red eye found, we are good to stay at church.

Well, the eye didn't get better. Since it was in the corner of his eye, I rarely noticed it. A week later my dad came to visit and noticed Spencer's eye. I really hate going to the doctor because of the wait and the copay that always result in just waiting it out, it will go away. But, if my dad was concerned, maybe I should take Spencer in, especially since my dad was willing to watch the kids.

I took Spencer in and guess what the pediatrician said, "I'm perplexed." Not a good sign if the pediatrician doesn't know what it is. She suspected it was allergies, but to be on the safe side, she scheduled an appointment with an Opthamologist at 1pm that afternoon. Wow, that was quick. Another bad sign.

The Opthamologist looked at it, checked Spencer's vision, dilated Spencer's eyes so he could get a look on the inside, and then told me what he thought. He said the inside of his eyes are clear, his vision is great. He can see an entry wound where it looks like something like a sliver of some kind, went into Spencer's eye and stayed on the surface. It was so swollen that he could not see if anything was still there, but by the reaction of the eye, it probably was. Solution: try antibiotic eye drops (Vigamox) and see if that clears it up and if it does not, surgery to remove whatever it is.

Well, three days later it has shown no sign of improvement. We are scheduled for surgery Monday morning. Basically what they will do is put Spencer out under general anesthesia. This is largely due to his age, a three-year-old cannot be still. It will be a 15 minute procedure where they cut off the spot, stitch the eye ball up, and it's done. Not a big surgery. It is on the white part of his eye, doesn't mess with the muscle, so it is pretty safe. He will be groggy the rest of the day and his eye will be bright red with some bruising. It is a pediatric Opthamologist doing the procedure at a Pediatric hospital, so I feel confident that they will be able to help Spencer be as comfortable as possible. But surgery is still surgery and that is never any fun.