Well, we've been through VT when she was in 2nd grade for my dd who is now 11. She went through a full year of once-per-week VT appointments (a 45 mile one-way trip from her school, which was already a 20 minute drive from our house). Plus she had exercises to do at home at morning and at night, eventually those dropped to once per day. A few thoughts for you to mull over:
Our VT exercises were not supposed to take more than 20 minutes at a time. Perhaps my family is a bit nuts when it comes to activities after school, but 20 minutes wasn't that tough for us to fit in and still have time to do ballet or whatever. Especially when my kids were in early elementary - there wasn't much homework on any given night except a 2-3 times per year when they had a big project to do, and those projects were usually more fun than "work".
Our dd's VT exercises changed a bit over time as her vision improved. I had to be involved of most of the early exercises, but after about 6 months or so there were more and more exercises that she did on her own. By the end of her program a large part of the exercises was via a computer program which I didn't have to be a part of at all.
The impact of vision challenges is different for each individual, but fwiw, I don't think that you could tell with my dd that she had vision challenges from things like dance etc. She didn't dance back then, but she is taking ballet and another type of dance class this year. She's doing fine with both. AND her vision is regressing - there's no doubt about that, she's seeing double vision again and now that she's older she recognizes what's going on. The impact for her is in close-up work. She can deal with it for tasks that require a longer visual field (and not too much peripheral vision). Reading, schoolwork, reading piano music are where her vision bothers her the most. *NOTE* that doesn't mean she isn't seeing double vision when she's looking farther away and/or her brain isn't shutting off the processing in one eye to compensate and/or her peripheral vision isn't severely compromised... it's just that she's dealt with that for so long that she compensates and can do things like sports etc and no one would have a clue that she doesn't have acceptable vision.
The difference VT made for our dd learning to read were beyond amazing! We didn't find out about her vision challenge until she was in 2nd grade and had already struggled with learning to read. I so wish we'd realized what was happening sooner and had her in VT much sooner - so my advice is to encourage you to stick with it through the end of your dd's program. It's a ton of work but soooo so very worth it! Also, please do not be discouraged because I mentioned my dd's vision has regressed - I feel strongly that a part of the reason her vision regressed is that she tired of her program toward the end and never completed it. In the years since we have encouraged her to keep up with her exercises and she has always refused. I think, even though she fought us on that, having gone through it once, having seen the difference it makes, knowing what type of exercises help etc - that was all very worthwhile. I suspected her vision was starting to slip about 6-8 months ago and she insisted all was fine. Now that it's regressed enough it's bothering her, she's matured enough to realize it does matter and she does want to do well in school so if she has to do VT again I suspect she'll be more invested in it this time around.
Hang in there - I know it's a long haul to get through!
polarbear
