My son likes, no, loves to read.

Linda,

Wow, how wonderful. My son’s reading keeps improving but don’t know if we’ll ever get to “I love to read”. He locks himself in his room listening to books on tapes so he clearly has the natural propensity, if we can ever get the processing together.

Some of the Neuronet exercises we’ve been doing have dramatically improved his word skipping and miscalling—and interestingly enough they are not visual exercises. They are working on auditory-motor integration. He is just the strangest case (of course, I now know I have the same deficit—it is basically not being able to say what you hear) He still using a finger to track, so there is something visual going on still. She thinks it is vestibular—rather than pure visual. I am waiting to see how far these exercises take us, before looking into vision therapy again.

BTW, his Neuronet therapist gave us a different set of exercises to work on the skills in Rosner’s book. She said there were so ways to compenstate when you use a grid, in other words, use a different part of a brain rather than the part you want to improve. Thought we’d try them for a month—my son loves them—and see if he can then do better on the test in the book. She said the fact that he loves them suggests that his problems are not primarily visual (as opposed to the motor exercises he had just been trying to avoid!)

Again, I am so happy for you. I can’t think of a better present.

Beth

Thanks Beth,

I should say it really wasn’t poof in that he worked really hard doing the exercises twice a day most of the time.

You might find it interesting that I saw this leap after he mastered the bilateral coordination and balancing exercises. I think control of his eye movements along with those exercises put it together for him. I do think it took both types of exercises.

I really have you to thank for some of this.

Your suggestion about finding a therapist that addressed vestibular issues lead us to a wonderful optometrist.

You know, Jami, too, has had sensory integration OT for visual processing. She has been walking around with a book in her hand lately - almost everywhere! (2 years of 30 min/wkly therapy)

Never thought I’d see the day that she wanted to read. Of course, I MUST admit that she still likes being read to as well.

What wonderful news, Linda!!! :-)

Janis

Wow! That’s really exciting. I’m thrilled to hear your son has made such progress. If I ever decide which vision therapist to go with perhaps we can get to that point too..just maybe.

Does your son notice a difference with his eyesight? Can he describe the difference between pre-VT to now?

Thanks for sharing and please continue to keep us updated.

He can’t describe it but does say general statements like, “things are better.” Even that is only when I ask if he has noticed a change.

Leah,

Did she have bilateral motor coordination issues? I wonder how much bilateral coordination of the body also effects the bilateral coordination of the eyes ie. binocular vision. The eyes have to work together to read.

It just seems to make sense that if you can’t coordinate both sides of your body you can’t coordinate your eyes which are on two separate sides of your body.

I think that just goes to show that there is more than one way to get all of this done.

I don’t know for certain what kind of visual processing deficits exist. I just know symptoms. And I know the SI OT has done wonders. Of course, she still can’t copy well from the board, but there are some things we can live with.

Wow, I am so happy for you and your son. And hopeful as we begin VT this week. Our son’s seem so similar, and you are always about 6 months ahead of us so its very very wonderful to hear your good news.

He must also feel so good about himself. Good work!

Just a note — and now all that hard work you did teaching him reading skills is returning benefits a thousand-fold!

Good luck and keep up the good work.