[blparent] visual stimulation and eye contact with babies

[Erin Rumer]

Hello,

I am totally blind with just a little light perception and I've just made
sure to look at my son when I'm talking to him and be expressive in my face
to convey what I'm saying in a visual way.  I also use hand gestures quite
often and lots of voice inflection to go along with my facial expressions.
When my son was as young as your son is now, I especially took care to get
nice and close to his face which he was always comfortable with since I did
it from day one.  I always felt that lots of hugs and kisses made up for the
lack of eye contact because what baby doesn't love to be loved.  You
probably do this as well but I often would check my son's face to see what
direction he was looking in.  This way I knew if I had his attention or not.
My son is 18 months now and while he looks at my face all the time, he does
look into my husband's eyes differently since they can make eye contact and
that's okay.  It won't affect your connection, communication or relationship
with your son.  He will learn like all of our kids do that he just needs to
communicate a little differently.  My son was only 5 months when he began to
interact differently with me verses my husband and that is awesome to see
how smart they are at such a young age.  My son learned that he couldn't
simply point at an object like he could do with my husband, but instead he
had to make a noise or crawl to what he wanted.  Before he could crawl I
often knew what he wanted just by the different sounds he made and it worked
great.  I nearly started crying yesterday when at the doctor's office my son
literally grabbed my hand in the hallway and began guiding me and actually
pulling me away from bumping into objects.  Now I just got to teach that
little guy to read price tags and we'll be ready to hit the mall! LOL

Best to you.

Erin

-----Original Message-----
From: blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Bernadetta Pracon
Sent: Friday, May 11, 2012 9:51 AM
To: blparent at nfbnet.org
Subject: [blparent] visual stimulation and eye contact with babies

Hi everyone,
This has been in the back of my mind for weeks now, and I'm wondering what
input you all have to offer.
As you may remember, I'm a first-time mother of a baby boy who is two months
old now. Both my partner and I are totally blind, and our son, as far as we
know, is regularly sighted. Since we're the ones who spend the most time
with him, I'm wondering how we can ensure that we are engaging him with
enough visual stimulation. I don't mean playing silly games like peek-a-boo
or making silly faces, etc. We're totally comfortable with that.  My concern
is the lack of eye contact. I've read that eye contact is an integral part
of an infant's development, and he gets that when his grandma and aunties
are over, but he spends much more time with us as I mentioned. How have the
rest of you dealt with that sort of thing--I'm mostly addressing people who
are totally blind, but everyone is welcome to input their thoughts.

Thanks in advance.

Bernadetta


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