As with any condition that's not well understood, there is no shortage of LD therapies or treatments that appear, on the surface, well... a bit kooky, let's say. By nature, I am skeptical of everything, especially if the person pitching the thing has a profit motive to get me to believe him. A lot of the crafty snake oil salesman try to pull a fast one on people like me by hiring people to say, "I was skeptical at first, just like you. But then I rubbed this ox urine on my face and wow! My IQ went up 90 points! Now I'm a believer and I got into Harvard! (results not typical)."

On the other hand, I do buy into some stuff that feels a bit like quackery, though I don't always buy into the reasoning for why the quackery does its quacky things. Let’s take acupuncture. So, I've got pain in my back and you want to stab me with several pins? Why is that, exactly? Oh, I didn’t realize that I had chi blockage. I could have sworn I had a chi movement just yesterday. Okay, so jabbing these pins will unblock my energy meridians and then my back can once again get lubed up on life energy. I get it. Actually, I don't. I do, however, think acupuncture helps people, though not for the metaphysical reason touted. I think it has something to do with nerves getting all jazzed up (technically speaking) and the like, or maybe it’s endorphins, or maybe it’s psychosomatic (as opposed to sane-somatic), but I really don’t care as long as it works.

Along those lines, I also don't generally buy into chiropractic treatments either, except maybe for short term back treatments. I once had a chiropractor tell me he could cure my reoccurring viral condition (in my vocal cords) by doing a little crackin' and straightnin' (I didn’t ask where). So maybe that event skewed my opinion of them as a group a bit... I'll bet that guy would tell me that my brain is out of alignment for not believing him.

Desperate people will stretch for the bizarre out of desperation, though. That explains a story I once saw in which terminal cancer patients went to South America to let a guy look at them for ten seconds and then write an unintelligible prescription on a piece of paper one day, then the next day fill that prescription by grabbing a hand towel with a pair of needle-nose pliers and then -- brace yourself dear Reader -- RAMMING IT INTO THE PATIENT'S NASAL CAVITY! And I don’t use capitals lightly. Then, to add more injury to the injury, the “doc” twists it violently and then jerks it out. And yes, the people know it's coming. And yes, they go to see the quack anyway. Why? Because they're desperate for help.

Some of us may feel that way with LD. We've got to help our kids, right? What if something might help? It's like the natural products that my family uses that so many of my friends now take great pleasure in teasing me about (you know who you are).

So we will try some things that sound a bit odd on the face of it if: one, I know someone has tried it successfully; two, I have some level of trust in the practitioner; three, there's no huge risk involved (like getting a ruptured nasal cavity or hole in the brain); and four, well, I can at least semi-afford it. There are probably fives and sixes out there too, but I can’t think of them at the moment.

In the “sounds crazy but it just… might… work” category are prism glasses used to help kids with “space” issues (as in “where they are in space” as opposed to “the final frontier”). It’s hard for me to understand, but we’ve had more than one specialist tell us that Isabella has spatial issues, saying that she’s not “grounded.” I’d say that applies to a lot of us, but I think they mean something else. Anyway, we just had an optometrist appointment about prism glasses last week, and I'll fill you in on what kind of stuff went on in a following blog. Later, after Isabella’s worn the glasses a while, I'll let you know if we think it helped her.