I have an 8 year old son who has been experiencing an unusual visual distortion, usually during the evenings. Everything will be normal, when out of the blue he will tell me that everything looks miniturized. For example, when we are watching TV, the TV appears normal, but everything else in the room gets very small, even people sitting right next to him.

It usually does not happened in the day time, and if we turn on the ceiling light, the syptoms usually go away. (The syptoms normally last a few minutes.)

This has been happening more frequently in the last few weeks. Prior to that it occurred only a few times over the last year or so.

Sorry, can't help, but your son is not the only one this has happened to. We've had an occasional post about visual distortion similar to your son's. Didn't get any answers though.
All I can suggest is a thorough ophthalmological exam, followed by a neurological exam.
Since this occurs in his peripheral vision, it wouldn't hurt to test his periipheral vision by moving an object from behind into his line of vision. He should be able to see it when it is even with him. Does that make sense?

Thanks for the response.

That used to happen to me all the time when i was a kid. When i was watching TV or staring at something for a long time. I used to describe it as everything looking far away. I never went to see about it, though. It didn't happen for years and then it did it again last year. I was visiting someone in hospital and was sat listening to them. After i'd been looking at them for so long they suddenly looked really small and far away. When i look away and move my eyes around it comes back to normal after a few seconds. I've always wondered what this was. Should i mention this to my optician?

Yes, see if your optometrist has heard of this before. We'd all be curious to know what it is.

Did you ever find out what the problem was?

I'm goiing to go out on a limb and say it sounds like one of the many, vaired, wacky manifestations of migraine aura........... since migraine auras are basically like a 'mushroom trip' without the mushrooms............... and like a trip, the visuals can be many and varied..........

Could it be a migraine aura without a headache?

The symptoms don't fit a migraine aura. Mom says when she turns on the overhead light the symptoms go away.

Shakira, yes it's possible to have an aura without a headache.

This condition in both people seems to be related to staring at an object.

Yeah, it happens to me when I'm looking at the same thing/person for a long time.