Dee Kassing wrote:
>.... Years ago,
> there was research that showed that lazy eye occurred  primarily in
bottle-fed
> babies.  The thinking was that only the baby's eye  that is farthest from
the
> mom's/caregiver's body had the chance to practice  focusing well because
the
> eye that was next to the adult's body was too close to  allow focusing.
Lazy
> eye very rarely occurs in breastfed babies, most  likely because they
usually
> feed from both breasts ...

Hi Dee,
Some of these eye conditions can be congenital, though.  My 3rd baby was
born with a binocular squint (which some would call "lazy eye", I guess).  I
was conscious that breastfeeding would help exercise the eye, very important
in the months before the opthalmologist wanted to see him.  When I sat down
to breastfeed I'd place myself so that the daylight and the interesting side
of the room where his siblings were playing could only be seen if my baby
moved his eye. At first he could only move the eye out of the inner corner
momentarily, but gradually he could hold it for a few seconds and move it
further.  Between feeds when he was awake, I'd use a mirror, taking him to
it to "see the other baby" and holding him so that he had to turn his eye to
see his reflection.  The mirror was great as it allowed me to see what he ws
doing.
We made good progress and later had eye-patching ordered by the
ophthalmologist, but my son still needed bilateral eye surgery before
starting school.  As surgery is as much an art as a science, the eyes still
weren't quite straight, and he chose to have follow-up surgery when he was
about 19.
(I've changed the subject line of this strand from "alternating sides and
bottle feeding" to "breastfeeding and eye exercises" for easier researching
of the Lactnet Archives in the future.)

Virginia
in sunny Brisbane, with glorious between-seasons weather.
Virginia Thorley, OAM, ThA, BA, IBCLC, DipEd, GS TESOL, MA
Private practice lactation consultant; cultural historial working in the
History of Medicine; PhD student.
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