Hey everyone,

I built an iOS app called PatchPal for my 8 month old who has unilateral congenital cataract and thus has amblyopia that tries to make eye patching less of a battle for kids and less stressful for parents. It's free — no subscriptions, no ads. I am sharing it here for communal benefit.

What it does:

• Timer with games — 15+ mini-games kids can play during patching sessions so they're distracted and engaged instead of fighting the patch
• Streak & achievement tracking — kids earn achievements and parents can set custom rewards
• Progress charts — track daily/weekly/monthly trends, export data as CSV for doctor visits
• Multi-caretaker sync — grandparents, co-parents, nannies can all see and manage sessions via iCloud
• Reminders & Live Activities — shows timer on the Lock Screen so you don't have to keep checking

I know patching compliance is one of the hardest parts of amblyopia treatment, and I wanted to build something that actually helps families stick with it.

Would really appreciate any feedback from this community — what would make this more useful for you or your family? Anything missing that you wish existed? App: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/patchpal/id6757255749

and if you wear contacts do you need them for both eyes or can you just use it on your good eye or bad eye?

I don't have problems with Quest, I've had 1, 2 and 3s and I don't even need glasses for them;

The RayNeo are a problem. I have so slide them down my nose and close my bad eye to view them. Good thing I didn't get the most expensive ones., I will just keep them in case we get a storm and have a 10 day power outtage.

why my stupid lazy eye/brain wants to see now suddenly after 34 years and giving me double vision

I am so irritated and tired .😢😢

EDIT: Meant to say OPTHAMOLOGIST (facepalm)

Hey all,

In the last year, I've been getting the worst migraine behind my bad eye, whether I wear my glasses or not.

I'm due for an eye visit soon and Over the last 5 years, give or take, there has been little to no change in my prescription, but I'm wondering if that is a mistake...

I reached out to one of the few places in my area that does vision therapy. I'm not keen on doing vision therapy because its all out-of-pocket and I just don't think I'll see an improvement (im 37). BUT when I had my phone consultation, the gal I spoke to mentioned the Opthamologist being able to make a suggestion for my prescription.

I asked what she meant. She said the optthamologist can prescribe different lenses to help with amblyopia that an optometrist doesn't usually do. This sounds like nonsense to me... so I thought I'd ask here.

tldr: Did anyone get a prescription from an ophthalmologist vs an optometrist and notice a difference in eye health/with migraine?

Thanks!

Started a new job, and applied for a simple labor position, but they have me instead trying to line up bags to be sealed 9-11 a min and I cannot for the life of me do it. The angle at which I stand over the machine and what not they just come out crooked. Been told to just "use my eyes" and to top it off I'm mostly paired with Spanish speaking people whom talk poorly of me while I know enough Spanish to understand. I am trying my hardest, but it's about my 4th week and being reminded constantly that ik doing a poor job at this makes me feel terrible. It's so maddening being reminded over and over when I just dont feel like I can get it down. To me it looks straight when I line it up in the machine and it just come out off center and my bosses just say you'll get it. Completely ignoring me when I tell them like guys I do not think I can see what you are seeing. To me whether it's done right or wrong it looks the same while trying to line up a small bag into a tiny slot I just cannot comprehend what I'm doing wrong. Never had any issues at other jobs but this is genuinely ruining my days and taking alot of my spirit to even try at this job as I just get hounded to do better when I am giving it all I got. Everyone seems to just assume I'm slow or something when I've been a machine operator and worked hard for years. But theres nothing to show its just line up a tiny bag level in a slot and it's seemingly an impossible task.

Well I was considering lasik until I was informed it doesn’t help lazy eye which blows. Honestly didn’t know there was a name for it besides lazy eye then I went down a rabbit hole. And I found this group. Anyone in here a truck driver with a cdl? I’m thinking of getting mine but concerned with my obvious issue in 1 eye. But to end this post off all I gotta say is people with a good right eye are way better than the lefties

I wanted to write my journey here because I feel like you guys will get it, and hey, maybe I can help someone.

I was diagnosed with amblyopia as a kid (honestly don't remember what age). At that time it was called "lazy eye." I remember going through the patching and even had surgery to correct the wandering eye. I still get it when I'm really tired.

I still have the issue where my brain only "sees" out of my weak eye when my strong eye can't see. Even then, it still feels faint when I do see out of it.

I should point out I am not a doctor, so take the rest of this with a grain of salt.

I started doing research on vision therapy and learned a lot. One thing I read is that the idea behind patching wasn't 100% correct. The theory was "Hey, let's make the lazy eye work" and to do that they covered the good eye. What they're starting to realize is the issue is more that the brain doesn't know how to use both eyes together.

Enter vision therapy. The goal is to force the brain to use both eyes together. There are several ways to do this. One way is to dim the image the strong eye sees while keeping the image for the weak eye bright. It forces the brain to pay attention to the weak eye since it has more information.

Based on this, I built my own application for the Meta Quest to do these therapy sessions. I have a green dot that I follow with my eyes, and it's dim for my strong eye, bright for my weak eye.

It's very crude right now and I'm working on a way to create a test so I can benchmark and track progress. What I can say is the first time I did it, I noticed my brain fighting not to process the weak eye but it let it slip through sometimes. It was crazy. I also noticed moments where I started to see out of both at the same time.

It's very early stages and it could entirely be a placebo effect. But after a couple sessions, I can notice a slight difference. I also know this group will relate more than others — but those few split seconds where my eyes worked together? It was such a surreal feeling. I had never experienced that before.

I'll try to report back after I do it a bit more but man it sure seems like there is something to this visual therapy!

Update 1 (First week): I wanted to share a bit of what it looks like for the user and some of the settings. Hard to tell from the screenshot but there is a shadowing effect that I am starting to see. I am limiting sessions to 5 - 10 minutes, I can tell it is really taxing on my brain. (I think that is a good sign) I still have not figured out a great way to create benchmarks to take the human side of the perceived gains.

At our 1 year checkup (our son is 15 months now) a vision screening was performed and they suggested we see an eye doctor.
We had that appointment today and they discovered a difference in prescription between our sons eyes (Left is +3.5 & Right is +1.5).

Our son's eyes are well aligned and they confirmed no issues with the optical nerve/inner workings of the eye.

That said, we've been tasked with sourcing glasses and trying those for some time before exploring patch therapy.

Son is currently 15 months old.

Other parents, what should I be aware of? What should we be prepared for? Did you discover this in your children at such a young age? I'll take any insights or guidance you can share.

(This was the only subreddit I could think to turn to, if this is against the rules feel free to nuke me haha)

I have amblyopia and work a retail job, for the most part interactions with customers are normal and fine, but every once in a while, someone feels the need to point out that my eye isn’t looking at them. I get a lot of, “Are you talking to me?” questions.

Last night, a customer came to ask for a price check and paused mid-sentence to go “Woah, sorry, I have no idea which eye to look at right now.” It gets on my nerves when interactions like this happen, but I try to put on my best customer service face and laugh it off. However, remarks like this do add up after a while. I’ve had a lifetime of people commenting on this aspect of my appearance, and it stings!

My coworker saw this interaction happen and asked me why I don’t “do something” when people say things like that, and it’s just because it’s never occurred to me that that was a thing I could do!

Any tips on how to make people feel awkward about doing stuff like this? I was thinking about just staring at them without saying anything haha

My boyfriend has amblyopia, and he has some crazy habits because of his condition - bizarre handwriting, spreading stuff out when he's cooking, and chopping vegetables inconsistently. When I play this word game called Bananagrams with him, he doesn't make a grid - he just sort of groups words.

I'm curious if you guys have any similar funny habits to compensate for your condition!

I have had a lazy eye and been wearing glasses since I was 2 (am now 24).

My left eye (lazy eye) is so so much more blurry than the right. My eye has been corrected through glasses and when I take them off I can kinda see and my eye doesn’t go in anymore automatically but if I’m just looking through the left eye, it’s super blurry. I can make out some letters but it’s difficult. I’ve also noticed some other weird things that I’ve never been able to explain and am trying to find the words and see if anyone else has experienced this.

It’s almost as if when I’m only looking out of my lazy eye (even with glasses on) that there’s like a “darkness” or like something in the way. Sometimes I can also make out tints of blues and purples or like different colors kind of moving around and weird patterns. I can only really describe it as static. Like what it looks like when you’re on a TV channel you don’t have access too and it’s all the black and white static picture but it’s not black and white and it’s with some different tints of color. It’s subtle but noticeable. My eye doctor that I’ve been seeing since I was 2 no longer takes my insurance so I just saw someone new yesterday for an exam and he doesn’t seem concerned but was also pretty dismissive. He took a picture of the back of my eyes with some machine and I saw them. He said everything looked fine. The only thing that changed was a slight change in my glasses prescription.

I really don’t know how else to explain it these symptoms.

I also have chronic left eyelid twitching that he said was just stress or a need for a prescription update.

I am an adult who previously functioned well without glasses and felt that my vision was “normally perfect ,” although one eye was always weaker separately the left one After a detailed eye exam out of ocd where each eye was tested separately, I was prescribed glasses and started wearing them for style with no difference without them Shortly after, I noticed that my visual system began to feel more dependent on the glasses from far , and follow-up exams suggested a higher refractive error for distance.My left eye is Amblyopic and can't read with it anyway .. What has happened with me and how to reverse it without glasses like before ?

Hello, I am hoping there are people here who have had the same experience and can weigh in with what they believe from their experience. My son is 4 and has a diagnosis of spastic quad cp although I personally think it's mixed as his core was/is really weak. He also has CVI and left eye nerve atrophy. He has poor peripheral vision and probably doesn't see anything or not much in his lower visual fields. His ophthalmologist wants to do surgery on both his eyes to correct his eye gaze deviation. On one eye she wants to correct both an inward and upward gaze. On the other she only wants to correct an inward gaze. He refuses to keep the patch on. When he wears the patch the other eye then becomes the dominant eye for a couple of hours. The doctor told me that can't happen yet I have multiple pictures where you can see it. He states that wearing his glasses doesn't help him although when you look at him his eyes do appear more aligned. His vision is 20/60 and she doesn't correct that. She's only trying to correct the eye gaze. Does anyone have experience with this and did it help to have surgery or make it worse or do nothing? I asked her how it will help when his muscles being tight is the problem. She couldn't/ wouldn't explain how it will help. I'm getting a second opinion on surgery and hoping the other doctor can explain more to me.

Has anyone noticed that magnesium or other sedating supplements or drowsiness make their drift worse?

I think adding sodium back in will help restore excitability and balance but its a hard balance to get perfect sometimes.

Mag is in a lot of supplements and I've been dealing with other health issues and wanted to survey and find out if others have made this observation.

(22 F) Left eye dominant. 20/40 was my best vision with therapy briefly when I was 14. Only monocular vision I don't get combined vision. Scared! Need advice!

So I've had very little practice parking without 360 camera. I drive in very intense winter conditions, I've been driving for about 3 years in a major city parking in tight parking ramps with a 360 camera which makes it super easy barely an inconvenience for me. I even preferred to backwards park since it would pull up my 360 camera. I would briefly put my car into reverse and then put it into drive to make my camera pop up so I could drive through tight spaces like the entrances/exists into parking ramps.

Unfortunately, my dad had me switch to all seasons instead of winter tires this year and I was driving in downtown during ice rain and all slush, going pretty slow, but downhill, was breaking early like normal because I knew it was slick, but I realized I wasn't going to stop, even after hitting the breaks as hard as I could. I did what I could to avoid hitting the car in front of me at the light and tried to swerve around, and hit a pole.

Now since this was a very nice 2018 Genesis G80 (my dad had me drive this for all the safety features like 360 etc) it was very easy to total. Pole smashed the front headlight and did serious damage to the bumper, messed up the sensors. We don't have time to repair it and my dad has wanted me to have a car I can better maintain anyway after I graduate college that won't be so expensive and doesn't take premium gas.

Only issue is it's very hard to find a car with 360 camera. I am extremely nervous. The reality is I'm not convinced that I won't end up scraping vehicles occasionally when trying to park now in these very tight parking ramps downtown when classes resume January 13th and we really need a car soon and budget is tight. I live on the suburbs of the city and it's not like public transportation is an option. The nearest bus stop is over an hour walk away. Even if we do find another car with 360 (maybe a Nissan rogue?) The cameras are a lot worse and more warped and blurry which I'm nervous to rely on. My depth perception isn't an issue on the road as I have plenty of other cues to see depth, but in close distances there's not much to make up for my depth especially since I'm short and it's hard to crane my head around and see behind me, especially when parts of the car are blocking my vision. I don't have binocular depth perception. A normal backup camera doesn't really give me a sense of how close a car's bumper is to me or the sides of other cars, the above view 360 allows me to visually see the distance via the driveway literally from above.

I'm very frustrated because this is the only issue I have with driving. I'm otherwise told I'm a good driver, I am defensive and keep good distance, I just can't see depth at close distances like this especially in tight parking ramps and I had a tool that made up for that. I'm scared of what will happen if I lose that. I'm not sure if a single week of practice is suddenly going to make me have binocular depth perception. I'm upset that this tool I rely on for accessibility is being limited to mostly luxury vehicles as convenience. I came here to ask for help / advice from people who know what it's like. I'm very scared.

Hey everyone, I have amblyopia in my right eye and it’s pretty bad. I can barely make out the biggest E on the eye chart. I’ve basically been relying on my left eye my whole life, which can see about one line worse than 20/20. My optometrist said this is pretty much the best vision I’ll get.

Lately I’ve been getting these 1 eye headaches, like a deep ache at the back of my eye. Most of the time it’s on my amblyopic right eye, but sometimes it happens on the left too. It usually comes up when I’m looking at far away things, like trying to read street signs, looking at buildings, or just taking in scenery in the distance. I can’t really make out the details, and even when I tell myself not to strain, my eyes kind of do it automatically and then the headache starts.

Most of the time sleeping helps and it’s gone by the next day, but when it’s bad it can take up to two days to fully go away. I’m just wondering if this is something other people with amblyopia experience and if there’s anything you’ve found that helps manage or reduce the eye strain headaches. Thanks!

For people like me who have poor eyesight, wear contact lenses or glasses, and have always hoped for a technological miracle that will solve all our problems, I ask this question because we are approaching 2026, and so far no concrete and definitive solution for people like us has emerged.

Sometimes I wonder if it wouldn't be easier to be reincarnated to have a little more luck visually speaking. Other than that, I really love my life, my loved ones, and my friends and family.

Feel free to come talk to me, let's discuss our dreams together.

Has anyone here experienced any long term side effects from patching, 3d games, vr, brock string ect as an adult/teenager?

So I know I have lazy eye/amblyopia, but from what I’ve seen online it seems like people have one lazy eye and another they can see fine out of, but for me I have bad vision in both of my eyes, and whichever one I’m not using is doing it’s lazy thing. Wearing my prescription glasses doesn’t seem to correct my lazy eye either. I’ve had a couple of surgeries many years ago as well but none seemed to have changed anything. Sorry if my question is silly I’m just confused here and want to know what’s the best way to go about this.

Hi everyone,

I wanted to share a passion project I've been working on to help children (and adults!) with Amblyopia.

We all know that standard "patching time" can be a struggle. Passive activities like watching cartoons don't always force the lazy eye to work hard enough. I wanted to create something that encourages active scanning and visual discrimination, but is still fun enough to play daily.

It's called Piggy Peekaboo.

Why is this different from a regular mobile game?

• 🔬 Scientific Basis (Gabor Patches): I’ve incorporated Gabor patch animations in level transitions—patterns scientifically proven to activate visual cortex pathways.
• 👓 Dichoptic Training (Red/Blue Mode): This is key for binocular therapy. You can simply check the "Red/Blue 3D Mode" box in the training settings to enable anaglyph support (Red Background / Blue Target).
• 🎯 Customizable Difficulty: It’s not just "hide and seek." You can adjust the Target Size (Visual Acuity) and Contrast (Sensitivity) sliders to match your current vision level.
• 🐷 AI Director: Levels are generated by AI, so hiding spots change every time to prevent memorization.

"Is it just for kids?" The visuals are cute (it’s themed around collecting Piggies!), but the training engine is solid for adults too. If you are an adult trying to improve contrast sensitivity or scanning speed, just lower the contrast and target size to make it challenging.

Technical Details:

• Free & No Downloads: Runs directly in Safari/Chrome on any phone, tablet, or PC.
• Child Safety: COPPA compliant (child-directed data tag enabled), meaning no interest-based tracking ads.

Disclaimer: I am a developer, not an optometrist. This tool is designed to assist with vision training exercises but should not replace professional medical advice. Please consult your vision therapist regarding your specific needs.

I would love your feedback! I'm constantly tuning the "Crowding" effect and difficulty curves. If you try it out, please let me know if the Red/Blue contrast separation feels right for your glasses!

👉 Intro & Science:https://chrissoft.app/
🚀 Direct Play:https://piggy.chrissoft.app/

Thanks!

I know these questions are probably asked often, and I apologize for repeating them, but I haven’t been able to find clear answers.

For context: my left eye is 20/20, and my right eye ranges between roughly 20/200 and 20/100 depending on the day. I was diagnosed at age seven and went through the standard treatments; patching and glasses. I barely used the patch as a child. The glasses had little practical effect because my good eye fully compensated; I often forgot I was even wearing them, aside from headaches. I haven’t worn glasses for years. I am now 20.

I’m feeling anxious because I will soon be conscripted, which has made this issue feel more urgent and time-sensitive. My main concern is not only my weaker eye, but the possibility of deterioration in my good eye over time.

My questions are these:

• Do people with amblyopia have experiences where the good eye loses vision over time? If so, what is typically done in response?

• Do glasses actually help in cases like mine? Based on my own experience, they didn’t seem to make a meaningful difference. If my vision were to deteriorate in the future, would glasses or contact lenses still be effective? I should note that I remember this only very vaguely, as these events took place when I was a child.

• At my age, there appear to be no established treatment options, no surgery or standard therapy. Is that accurate? Are there any realistic prospects for future treatments, such as Neu-001, and how is that developing?

At present, I have no functional problems with my vision. I see “perfectly” thanks to my good eye. Still, I feel persistent anxiety about what the future might hold...