WELCOME TO OUR PRACTICE
At Looking Forward Vision Therapy, we provide high quality, compassionate care for complex vision problems that require specialized treatment not available in most general optometry settings. Vision Therapy can lead to improved visual skills and quality of life in every area, from academics and professional work to athletics and personal goals.
DR. DOUCETTE
Developmental and Behavioral Optometrist
Dr. Cathleen L. Doucette is a graduate of the New England College of Optometry, an Associate of the College of Optometrists in Vision Development and a Clinical Associate of the Optometric Extension Program Foundation. After providing primary eye care for more than 25 years, specializing in pediatrics and vision therapy for more than 10 of them, Dr. Doucette is now focused entirely on her specialty practice of vision therapy and vision rehabilitation.
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As a behavioral optometrist, Dr. Doucette is dedicated to helping her patients improve their visual function so that they may experience more comfortable vision, but also realize their full potential in academics, sports, work, and life.
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Outside of work, she loves the theater, being in nature, cooking, and spending time with family. 
PATIENT STORIES
Prior to our daughter’s VT assessment, it was assumed that all her reading difficulties were learning disability based. We soon discovered that our daughter is an excellent reader - it was her eyes that were the issue. After many months, the VT has changed our daughter’s reading ability, along with her academic success in school, for the better. We are overjoyed with the results from VT.
Parents of M.G.
Before vision therapy I had challenges with post-concussion syndrome, which was causing me to have blurred double vision and feeling as if I couldn’t clearly focus. It made me feel depressed and frustrated because I couldn’t enjoy doing things that I loved prior to my concussion.
After attending Vision Therapy once a week for six months, I have significant improvement in my vision. There are periodic evaluations to help set goals on fine-tuning vision. You need to do the work at home to succeed, so be committed! Most importantly, Dr. Doucette was so wonderful to work with. She is patient, very knowledgeable, and has taught me about how vision actually works. This knowledge has helped me to understand why and how to correct the issues I was experiencing.
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Ellen
Before vision therapy, Alexis had challenges with reading, skipping lines, eyes getting tired, tearing up, and not wanting to read.
Alexis’ reading has much improved since starting vision therapy. She is able to keep her place when reading. She reads for longer periods of time. Reading comprehension has improved. She will pick up books and read on her own.
Alexis' mother
I’ve been doing vision therapy for over six years. I am studying dance and was struggling with balance and coordination. Working with Dr. Doucette has helped to improve those issues and launch me into a higher level of dance and artistry. In general terms, vision therapy has helped my brain to interpret the information that my eyes are seeing and letting me focus on other things like where my body is in space, picking up on social cues, better focus while doing schoolwork, better hand eye coordination, and better depth perception.
[For anyone considering vision therapy and is unsure whether to start] All in all I think vision therapy is worth looking into. I have learned so much about myself and can’t wait to continue working with someone as dedicated to their craft as Dr. Doucette.
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Violet
Before vision therapy, Lucas had various academic challenges including reading, spelling, writing, and focusing on his homework.
Lucas was intrigued by the idea of reading from an early age but would often lose his place while reading and/or reread the same sentence by mistake. No matter what we tried he continued to struggle, which put him further and further behind and was beginning to impact his work in other areas.
In terms of spelling, we would practice and practice throughout the week for his spelling tests, but he would consistently score 8 out of 15 or lower each week. Writing and forming both letters and numbers was also a huge challenge where he would often write his letters and numbers very illegibly and sometimes backwards. This impacted his ability to write a coherent paragraph and complete his math homework without a huge struggle. With all these challenges he was losing focus on schoolwork which was ultimately impacting his confidence and his love of learning.
We are so grateful to have found Dr. Doucette when we did upon being referred by a friend. There are many personal achievements that Lucas has experienced as follows:
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Lucas now has an interest in reading independently for fun, which never was the case prior to vision therapy.
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Lucas now scores on average 14/15 in his spelling tests each week.
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Lucas’s writing has also improved significantly, and he is now able to not only write neatly but in a well thought out and creative way.
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Lucas’s overall love of learning and confidence has also increased where he recently applied to become a Peer Leader for his third-grade class!
We are so grateful for Dr. Doucette’s help and expertise. Lucas officially finished his vision therapy the day before his 9th birthday, and he is finishing the school year with confidence in himself and a renewed love of learning!
Lucas' parents
Before vision therapy, Nora had challenges with reading and focusing on close work, such as worksheets. When we had her evaluated by Dr. Doucette, we were able to understand how much her vision was impeding her ability to do schoolwork and other tasks.
We are not even through (our VT program) with Dr. Doucette, and we are already seeing amazing improvements. In fact, she read an entire chapter book on her own for the first time ever! Additionally, her behavior and confidence have greatly improved.
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It takes hard work and commitment, but we are so happy we did this for her. Dr. Doucette is excellent at what she does!
Nora's parents
Cory reported that along with improvement in vision that he experienced, he noticed a huge difference in positive behavioral changes since vision therapy. "The exercises allowed me to improve in ways that I didn't initially expect. I could also notice clear improvement from day to day, which was very encouraging."
Cory
College Student
Before vision therapy, Jamerson had challenges with reading and doing schoolwork, he absolutely hated reading and had a very difficult time with it. When he read, he said the words would move all over the page. Reading would also give him headaches, make him feel dizzy, and very fatigued. He would often make up any excuse to get out of reading. Every night my husband and I would dread helping Jamerson with homework. He would often get frustrated and end up yelling and crying. We were really worried about how this was affecting Jamerson’s self-esteem.
Vision therapy has made a huge difference in his life. Slowly but surely, we would see small improvements in his vision and his reading. After about a month he had no more headaches, dizziness, fatigue, and words no longer moved on the page while reading. It didn’t happen overnight and Jamerson did put in a lot of hard work, but it was well worth it. He is now reading at grade level and doing extremely well at school! I can honestly say his confidence and self-esteem has skyrocketed! Jamerson has a newfound love of reading. He is also no longer afraid of heights and now has the confidence to try new things, like waterslides!
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Jamerson's mother