'When doctors said my baby will always need glasses, I didn't expect the grief and guilt.'

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At just 16 months old, my daughter now wears glasses around the clock. She's also been prescribed patching for her mild eye turn.

My rational brain knows this is okay. She's healthy. Glasses are so normal these days.

I repeat to myself: I am lucky, I am grateful. I have two healthy children, and in the scheme of things, this is minor.

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But my heart hasn't caught up with my head. My heart feels sad.

I am sad that she must carry this so young. Sad that my baby girl, who still toddles unsteadily on her little legs, has something that marks her out before she can even say her own name.

Sad that her little face, still round with babyhood, is now framed by lenses. Sad that she won't feel and be as "free" as other children the same age.

The tears came hard and fast when we found out. I'm talking in the reception of the specialist's office and on the drive home (that I tried desperately to hide from her – because, well, parenting).

Image: Supplied.

Now they come subtly, only on occasion – when I catch sight of her tugging at her frames (which we honestly struggle to even keep on), or when we peel the patch off, and she cries in pain, frustrated and annoyed as she adjusts to this new reality. It feels unfair – though I know life rarely promises fairness.

And then comes the guilt. Because I know glasses and patching are hardly tragedies.

Children and families all over the world face enormous medical challenges – or would give anything just to have a child to walk through these struggles with. Of course, I know this to be true.

I remind myself every day how fortunate I am, that glasses are a privilege of modern medicine.

Still, the lump in my throat won't dissolve because she is my baby, my baby girl. She is just so little. And the truth is, it hurts to see anything come between her and the freedom of being just that little.

And so, I'm allowing myself to cry if I need to. To feel sad. To admit that while I know, logically, how lucky I am, my emotions are real too. They don't erase my gratitude. They sit beside it. Both can be true at once.

What I fear most isn't the glasses or the patch themselves – it's how the world will treat her because of them.

Image: Supplied.

Will other children tease? Will she be left out? Will she feel different, less than? Will she get to run, jump, swim and play sports like other kids? I fear the sideways glances, the questions, the thoughtless comments.

And yet, maybe that's where the lesson lies – for both of us.

Maybe this tiny pair of glasses will become part of my daughter's story: the thing that makes her stand a little taller, fight a little harder, see a little more clearly – in every sense of the word. Maybe she'll discover kindness in others sooner than most, or find friends who love her not despite her differences, but because of it.

And perhaps it will change me too. Because motherhood has a way of showing us our own edges – raw and exposed, in plain sight.

Maybe this will teach me about letting go of the illusion that I can control every outcome, that I can protect her from every adversity, every challenge, bump, bruise – or every unkind word. Maybe it's actually me who has to let go – because I have no doubt that she will.

And after all, my daughter is still the same bright, beautiful, bold and curious soul she was before glasses and patches.

In fact, these things will help her see the world more clearly – literally and figuratively.

And I'll be right here beside her, every step, learning to see it differently too.

For more honest conversations about motherhood, listen to Mamamia's parenting podcast, Parenting Out Loud.

Feature image: Supplied.