Seeking Advice from Moms Who Have Dealth with This

It could be allergies, especially if it only happens at day care and shortly there after. That is my only thought.

A., I daycare and I have a little boy that does that when he is tired. Just like you are explaining..it startedwith ahabit too..hewill do it now when you look at him.I think heis just aware of his eyes.

I would put some eye drops in his eyes to see if they are dry and bothering him. Do they have fans going in the daycare that are drying his eyes out? Or even the air conditioning? Does he have allergies?

I would consider all of these...he may just be starting a new habit because hehas realized he can control his eyes....L.

Ever since I was a child, whever I had something in my eyes, or I was tired I would blink a lot. His eyes are probably irritated by either pollutants or allergens, or he may just be tired.

Hello A., Have you checked with the daycare to see if he had any "new" contacts yesterday. (food, toys, kids etc)... It sounds like he might be having an alergic reaction to something. Possibly the daycare used a new cleaning product on the toys, or a field trip that took him somewhere he came into contact with, or a new food.. . The next thing I'd watch for is a "nervous reaction", in other words. Check to see if this is happening again this morning before daycare, and then this afternoon afterwards. . . Maybe there's a new kid on the block . . . new "stressers" your son maybe reacting to. Good luck . . . hope he's feeling better.

not sure if this helps at all, but I had 2 thoughts.
I had a neighbor growing up who did that often, and it was a nervous thing. I dont know, but maybe something in daycare is stressing him out. probubly not, but thats what first came to mind, the second was allergies. It could be anything from a new airfreshiner to a flower that just started blooming or the perfume the daycare provider wears. Just a thought.

OMG, my 3 1/2 is doing the same thing. It is like he just discovered his eyelids. His favorite thing to do is tell me his is running out of batteries or gas and then he will blink his eyes to prove he is really almost out. I think it is damn cute!! If your boy doesn't complain about his eyes bothering him, I think it is just an awesome discovery thing!!

My daughter has mild Tourettes and one of her tics is strange blinking. Your child could have formed a tic, possibly as a way to deal with stress. It won't hurt anything.

I would see if he picked this up from someone at daycare.I would talk to the staff there.If nothing comes of that call a dr.My friends son does that and has the same and has seizures.I know this from being the health care field and taking care of people with seizures as well.In my daughters case she was copying my friends son.Best wishes and try not to panic.Its most likely your son is immitating something he learned from another child or someone winking at him.Allergies?Dry eyes!

My son is 20 mos. and at about 18 mos. he did this. We went to an allergist because of skin problems. They said, after 41 holes from the prick test, that he's allergic to eggs, peanuts, cashews and birch. It cost $886. and our share is $337. Ouch! He doesn't get eggs or nuts and has to have a bath daily but he doesn't blink like that anymore. I was thinking it could have been dry eyes or stress that we all felt from seeing him suffer. Good luck. Sorry not more helpful.

I can remember discovering that when you squint your eyes a bright light looks like a star and stuff like that. He may just be playing with the way that it changes his vision so I wouldn't worry about it too much. If it goes on or you notice other tics, thats when I would get it checked out.

Well, don't panic.. This is very common at his age. My son picked up a "tick"-- not a bug! One day I noticed while talking to him and looking at him in the rear view mirror, he would blink and add an eye roll. I asked of course if his eyes were bugging him, and grilled him too much! It seemed to make it worse, teh more attention I gave it caused him to stress and he would do it more! At day care he would be fine while concentrating on something but the moment he had down time it's like a flood gate would let loose and he would rapid blink and eye roll.
For the good news? I just sort of went away after a few weeks. I did a ton of research on the internet, google, "rapid blinking-- syndrom". And found it's very common for this to occur, mostly in boys, but typically before the age of 7 I believe. In most cases it will fade away, in only a small % will it manifest to somethign more.
Please take my advice, don't make an issue of it. He will stress, and make it worse. I remember him saying, "MOMMY! I just can't help it! They do it themselves!" Pretend it's not happening. Good luck!

I do the same thing with my eyes because they're too dry. I have allergies which dry out my eyes but being dry may also have something to do with genetics. Both my father and an aunt had the same difficulty.

Everyone can get dry eyes when the eyes are over exposed to wind and sun. His eyes may have been exposed to something to cause this reaction. My grandkids like to stand in front of the fan and they rub their eyes when they stop.

Eye drops do not help me. My aunt eventually had some of her tear ducts plugged and her eyes were less dry. The tear ducts drain the tears from the eyes. I don't know how the tears get to your eyes.

For reassurance, I would recommend that your son gets an eye exam by an eye doctor which is a more thorough examination than at the pediatrician's office. Make sure it's not a cross eye or a lazy eye or other eye health issues that can limit their eyesight in the future. Most kids don't know what they are suppose to see, don't know how to express it and maybe afraid to. So just as if you take the kids to the dentist for routine check, the eyes need to be checked routinely at that age. Hopefully it's just something normal!

A.,
Does your son have long bangs? I have seen many kids at school who started blinking a lot since their hair was in their eyes. It seems that even after it was cut, some of them would continue since it became a habit. It's just an idea....Good luck to you!

A.,
I have not directly heard of this, however I do know that children have a funny way of compensating for things that may be vision related. A child can walk around for years with vision problems and really compensate well.
When a child has an eye exam by a OD (optometrist), the OD should syclo (dilate) the child to check the health of the eye as well as any vision correction they may need.
Has your son ever had an eye exam? If not, it may be safe to have him checked to rule out any problems vision related!!!
Check around on your options, it can be quite expensive. However just remember we only have one set of eyes!!
Your a good mom to notice signs so quickly,ask questions and take action.
Have strength and Take Care of your little one!
D. C

We had almost this exact same experience at about the same age, sudden onset of blinking and type of blinking. Went to ped for something else while obsessing about whether to go in for this or not, and he checked his eyes and said nothing to worry about. Normal developmental deal. It went away after two or three weeks. Strange. I would just keep monitoring the situation and ask if anything hurts, etc. In my child's case, there was no injury. Hope it goes away quickly on its own.

I heard on a news channel that blinking is actually good for the eyes and because we as a society are always watching tv and on the computer we don't blink enough, having said that, it is really disconcerting to see your child blink excessively, but I don't think it's something to worry about. My two cents worth

My son did this for a while. He has allergies so I thought that that might be the cause, but our doctor said that a lot of times kids this age, especially boys, do funny things with their faces and that they just don't realize that it looks funny. They just do it for a while and then they grow out of it. Our son grew out of it, he's now five. I'd make sure there is nothing irritating his eyes and if not it could just be a funny habit he's formed and that he'll grow out of.

my son used to do the same thing. he would blink really fast, then close his eyes hard or open them really wide. i never did figure out why he did that, but it eventually stopped. I figured he probably picked it up from another kid at daycare. it's probably nothing to worry about, just a particular toddler thing, but if your truly concerned, i would suggest seeing your son'd doctor.

My son is almost two and does this once in a while. It's not really related to anything; I think he's just becoming more aware of his eyes and he like to test them out.

I would suggest taking him to the eye doctor to get his vision checked. My guess is, he is not seeing clearly which is why he is acting that way.

My son was about this age when his preschool teacher recommended that I take him to see a eye doctor. It turned out that he was cross-eyed and he needed to wear glasses for a while.

If your son continue this behavior I would see an eye doctor for him.

OMG my daughter did this for a while at about 2 1/2 yrs old. I was worried about her vision because eye problems run in our family. She was checked by her peditrican and they said she is fine. Evidentially it is a weird little thing some kids do because their eyes are dry, or the breeze feels funny, or the light (sun) was bright in their eyes etc. Aren't kids funny???They love to do weird little things to make us worry over nohing.

If you are worried I would just make an appointment with his doctor.

PS My daughter stopped doing this so much about 3 days after the trip to the doctor. But at least I wasn't worried about it for those three days.

I used to do that when I was a kid. I think it was a habit or kind of like from nervousness or stress (almost like a tic). Anyhow, it will probably pass. Just make sure he does not have any issues with his sight or something in his eye! I hope this helps, S.

Kids do things like that all the time. he may have had something in it or rubbed it. It does not seem to be that big of a deal. he should be fine

Well, my own child hasn't done this, but my mother has told me that *I* did it as a kid! It was right around that age - preschool - and she's said that my teachers assured her that I was doing it for attention. I have no memory of this (lol) so I don't know when it stopped, but I'll agree with the others - it's probably nothing to worry about. Perhaps he's adjusting to being with a group of children? New teacher maybe? I'd see if there have been any changes at the daycare - that might explain it!