1/3rd of the Brain

I was watching a show on the brain the other day.   There is so much that our brain uses to make decisions on based on vision that our visual cortex takes up nearly one-third of the brain.   That’s a huge percentage.   After almost two years of blindness (or very poor vision) with my daughter I’ve come to a completely different understanding and level of appreciation for how incredibly important vision is to us.

I stopped counting the number of times each day that I’d see or hear something that specifically references vision (in a song, for instance) or about information gathering (such as what color sign indicates clearance merchandise) or even a closeup of someone’s eyes in a commercial, which is a lot more common than you’d think.

My daughter goes for another EUA on Monday.   Her right eye is covered in internal scar tissue and she can’t see out, that is if she can see at all.   We’re hoping to have a plan for her right eye after Monday.   If it doesn’t function then we’ll likely abandon it for now.   But we do want to give it a chance because age six is when amblyopia will have a much larger impact.   Meaning that one-third of her brain dedicated to vision will get permanently remapped to other things.   

And while its good that the brain is flexible, we’d rather it be used for vision if there is actual functional vision.    It’s not a high hope, but it’s a hope I still hold on to in part.  

The Big Boy Update:  My son wanted to do round offs and cartwheels and back bends and hand stands and a lot of other things with me in the front yard today for special time.   I could hang with him on some of them and even taught him a few new tricks but I told him I was going to pull a muscle.   He kept telling me he’d help me pull a muscle.   It wasn’t until we were back in the house that he finally understood pulling a muscle was bad.   He said, “oh, I thought you wanted to do that to exercise.”

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter explained to us tonight at dinner what a lockdown drill was at school.   She knows the entire procedure, including why the bathroom doors should be shut because the echo was making too much noise.   She talked about how the principal announces it over the intercom and then said, “you know, the principal I pied in the face”.   Putting a cream pie in her teacher’s face was it seems, memorable.