Hi,
My first post here. I am currently having a fight with my wife. We recently discovered our daughter who is 10 had developed short sightedness of 1.5. That is not too serious but nonetheless we got her a pair of glasses since she told us she couldn't read the chalk board at school. I have heard some kids with mild short sightedness may become better when they grow up simply because they eyeballs were not fully developed when they were young. So, my position is, give her short sighted glasses to get her through school and somehow try to change her bad reading (she'd rather read than eat) habit and hope her vision doesn't get worse too quickly.

I don't know where my wife heard this from, she started saying we should get my daughter a pair of far sighted glasses of the same amount to try to correct her short sightedness. I disagree with that because I have never heard of that anywhere. Her response was that this is a cover-up to protect the eye glasses industry. I have my doubts but I keep an open mind. I did a quick google search and could not find any discussion of the kind. Has anyone heard of anything like that? Could anyone tell me if short sightedness can be corrected by far sighted glasses? Thank you very much in advance.

Some studies suggest wearing a bifocal lens perscribtion for childeren with myopia (nearsigtness).In a preliminary study supported by the National Eye Institute (NEI), researchers have found that children who wore bifocal eyeglasses had a slightly slower progression of myopia, or nearsightedness, than children who wore traditional single-vision eyeglasses.

The randomized trial was conducted with 82 children between ages six and 12, all of whom had myopia and a condition called esophoria, which is a tendency for the eyes to cross while reading. A minority of all myopic children have esophoria. The researchers found that, after 30 months, the children wearing bifocals had slightly reduced progression of myopia compared with the control group that wore regular eyeglasses.

It is suggested that you and your wife check with your optometrist and have he/she explain the possible benifits of bifocal glasses for your daughter.

Eyes

Dad, reading is never a bad habit. Don't discourage her from reading, but tell her to exercise her eyes every hour by changing focus for a few minutes.

Thanks for your reply.

Oh, you misunderstood me. Perhaps I should elaborate what I meant by "her bad reading habit" a little bit. She is already a chubby girl to start with. If we don't stop her, she could read from the moment she wakes up in the morning until she couldn't hold her eyes open anymore at night without getting out of bed, brush her teeth, change her clothes, eat and use the bathroom all done laying in bed with no lighting.

I never discourage her from reading. I just want her to have a better reading habit like you were saying and perhaps spend a little time outside the house.... maybe? That I know is a very tough task because my wife is also quite an inactive person.

Ah, ok, gotcha. Everything in moderation :)

I suggest an optomitrist (sorry,I can't spell well) or ophthalmologist decide what type of lens would be best for her glasses.
You can ask them about eye excercises. some eye problems benifit from such excercise and some don't.
The Dr can advise you.