My left eye was damaged from birth. No central vision. Plenty of peripheral vision. My left eye's condition hasn't changed since birth.

My right eye was perfect from birth.

When I was 25 I started getting active incidents in my right eye a little to the top and left of center. I've had about one incident a year in the 13 yeaers since then in roughly the same spot, but only 3 of them were serious enough to cause vision loss. Right now I have lost vision in the top left up to the center, but I can still read and watch movies etc with the vision in the 3/4 of vision that is unaffected. But I see everything obstructed. like looking at stuff with a BB floating in front of my eye.

I don't know what triggered the reactivation. The doctors I've spoken to say they're not sure, but toxo generally gets active when the immune system is weak for any reason. But there's nothing specific in my health that they can identify. I'm generally in good health for my age with no other issues. The thing about toxo is that the parasite lives in cysts in the retina and can stay dormant for decades but then activate.

I'm sorry to hear about your son. The only advice I can offer is to look into prophylactic care. There is an anti-biotic that can keep flare ups from happening. I have been unable to take it because I'm allergic, which is why I have yearly flareups.

Also, teach your son to know the warning signs. A new attack usually starts with a pulsing in distinct areas of vision. It looks kind of like an animated hurricane image on a TV satellite map that fades in and out with a shimmery effect.

With a bad attack, it gets worse until it feels like you just looked into the sun, where there's a dark after-image obscuring your vision.

Whenever the swelling hits hard, you also get hundreds of spot floaters and darkening of vision. It looks like hundreds of seeds floating in front of you.

Hope that helps. I'm happy to answer more questions.

Very rare.

Many people have regular toxo. In some countries where it's hot and damp, up to 90% of the population might have it and feel nothing as long as their immune systems are healthy.

But ocular infection requires a mother-to-child transmission in utero. In utero can, even more rarely, also cause problems like swollen heads...but the primary issue is scarring on the back of the retina from swelling during active infection phases.

The major problem with toxo in the retina is that the infection NEVER GOES AWAY. It goes through cycles of activity and cysts of dormant parasites will remain embedded in the retina between active periods. Once a cyst is established, there is no way to remove it. Sometimes the cysts don't activate for decades (as with me) Sometimes it starts activating and then keeps activating every year for a decade (as with me). A major risk is for the active parasite to colonize new areas of the retina setting up new cysts there.

As I said, there is no cure. No real treatment even. You can only use an antibiotic prophylactic to prevent activation from the cysts.

I hear it's effective, but I'm allergic to the antibiotic, so I'm not able to benefit. I'm in the middle of trying an alternate antibiotic prophylactic, but it seems only marginally effective.