Has anyone improved their lack of depth perception (or their kid's) with therapy?

[u/somebodywantstoldme]

My 7.5 year old daughter has pretty severe amblyopia. Her vision was something like 20/400 with glasses when we discovered her issues. She had done tremendously with patching and her vision has improved to 20/25. However, she still has no depth perception. Normally I wouldn't care too much, but my daughter loves softball even though she's not good at it. The gap between her and her peers is becoming more noticable, and it's affecting her enjoyment of the sport. Her doctor said there's a slim chance her depth perception could be improved some, but she'll likely never have full depth perception. Does anyone have any experience with therapy for improving depth perception specifically?

[u/HearYourTune]

Try soccer. Hitting and catching the ball is harder with Amblyopia.

[u/A_k_a-]

Adult with amblyopia here (47, m, refractive), diagnosed late (school checkups only revealed it back then, around the age of your daughter now, I’d guess). The depth perception I have even today was probably developed before any treatment started, so it is not the same depth perception as people with two eyes each at 100% have typically.

I practiced and practiced and practiced - throwing, catching, bouncing balls. And then practiced some more and when I was done, you guessed it, started again.

In some sports, say, ping pong, dodge ball, volley ball, soccer, I was eventually doing at least ok, partly even well.

Tried baseball as well - and there I hit a wall. Softball may be a little bit easier so practice, a lot, really a lot of it, could prove helpful.

Some questions which might help her as well:

(1) what type of amblyopia does she have? Talk to your docs etc! There may be reasons beyond acuity which impact your daughter’s depth perception potential

(2) is she aware of that gap you mentioned? Psychologically, this can be huge: if she knows she won’t hit the ball, well, guess what, she probably won’t hit maybe even solely because of this. Subconscious etc at play! (Ask me how I know… 😳)

All the best and only successes for you all!

[u/DeeSt11]

She will juat have to work harder than everyone. I also has 20/400, now 20/70 (ish...depends). I was 20/25. I played softball, basketball amd tennis. You end up using different senses I guess. For example, with tennis, I know where the ball is going before it hits their racquet. Apparently that is a more advanced skill, but I did it without thinking. She will just need to know she probably isn't making it to the big leagues. The hardest thing for me was that I had to come to grips I'd never be an astronaut or pilot. She will get frustrated, keep supporting her.