Family Travels 4 Hours Round-Trip to Get Treatment

How badly did Holly Jacobs want to help her son fix his reading problem? For more than a year, the family drove to Dr. Rick Graebe’s office in Versailles from their home near the Tennessee border.

That’s four hours roundtrip. Was it worth it?

“Everything worked out perfectly for us,” said Jacobs, a high school English teacher in Williamsburg. “We were so thankful to find Dr. Graebe.”

Those thanks go to the teachers and support staff at Whitley Central Elementary who connected Holly with Dr. Graebe.

A behavioral optometrist, Dr. Graebe specializes in Vision Therapy, which is a non-invasive program of sequenced treatments that work as a kind of physical therapy for the eyes, brain and body.

The treatment is especially effective in helping students with reading difficulties.

A speech therapist at Whitley Central Elementary noticed that Holly’s son Ty, now 9 and then in first grade, had trouble tracking words across the page.

An occupational therapist confirmed that observation and recommended that Ty receive Vision Therapy from Dr. Graebe.

“I had never heard of Dr. Graebe, but when I learned he was the best, we had to make the drive,” Holly said. “When it’s your child, you hate to take him somewhere other than the best.

“We thought Ty’s reading didn’t match up with where we thought he should be, and that was concerning.”

So for all of second grade, Ty and his family drove two hours to Versailles every other week. Ty left school early, arrived in Versailles at 5 o’clock for the 45-minute treatment, received extra homework and headed back home – another two hours in the car.

Ty worked with Dr. Graebe’s daughter Allie, who guided him through the Vision Therapy program.

The results were dramatic. His test scores skyrocketed. At the end of second grade, Ty was reading at the fifth grade level. That improvement has continued in third grade.

“Before Ty had to work super, super hard to keep up with his reading,” Holly said. “Now, he doesn’t have to work as hard.”

And he loves reading, especially about dinosaurs, his favorite subject at the moment.

“To come from a place where I didn’t know Vision Therapy and to see that result, that was great,” Holly said. “Everybody we encountered there was amazing. This was definitely a blessing.”