Duanes Syndrome

Who is Duane? Do I know a Duane? The question you should be asking is what is Duanes?

Duanes Syndrome is a condition which can only be diagnosed after birth and after about 3 years. Within six weeks of being in womb, the sixth cranial nerve which deals with eye movement doesn’t develop properly. Causing irregular or absent abilities to move the eye in certain direction. Type 1, means you cannot move your eye in towards your nose. Type 2 means you cannot move your eye out towards your ear and the third type means you cannot move your eye either way. It sort of just moves slightly both sides but never to the maximum angle that the eye can move.

Being a cranial (brain) condition, nothing can be done to fix Duanes. You can only use technology and tools to make life easier. Approximately only 0.1% of the population has Duanes Syndrome and only 10% of all cases are hereditary.

I have Duanes. At birth I was misdiagnosed as a childhood squint. Which I grew out of.. I also have Amblyopia, a lazy eye is the common name. Having a lazy eye never really bothered me. I always knew my vision wasn’t normal but I always related it to my lazy eye. Now only at 20 I have been diagnosed with Duanes Syndrome Type2.

The disabilities if you would call it that, which I have due to my Duanes (being in my left eye), would be that I cannot see under my left arm to shave it. When putting on make up or tweezing my eye brows I cannot see properly if I close my non-Duanes and strong eye. When I attempt to drive, the left side of the road is a complete blur and turning my head to check a blind spot is impossible for me to do it safely while driving. Because by the time I have turned my entire body around to see if there are any cars behind me, I will have swerved all over the road and probably smashed into a few cars.

If I am tired my lazy eye really looks lazy. If I turn my head sideways and relax my lazy Duanes eye falls in towards my nose. It looks really weird if you see it do that.

I went onto Facebook and found a group of people from all over the world of all ages who also have Duanes or their children have Duanes. It was a great relief to meet other adults who also have Duanes. They each share their stories and give advice on how to cope with Duanes and the simple things you can do to make life a little easier. One woman’s advice for driving was to have extended mirrors so that she wouldn’t have to do the 180 degree turn just to look behind her to change lanes.

I will be seeing an ophthalmologist soon and that will be my judgement day. Bring on the lenses, the torches and the examination board with letters EXDRT! I’m ready to tackle my poor vision once and for all.

Once again, the devil finds work for idle hands, and my hands are not idle..
Cheers for now!

C
xx