Youth eye dominance help

[az_runner]

I’ve been in a funky place with my youngest for the past year and wanted to get some thoughts or suggestions from you guys.

My 8 year old is right-handed and left eye dominant, on top of that he has pretty poor eyesight that is improved by glasses and eye therapy by way of a patch. From what I’ve read and found is that he should be using a left-handed bow. He does struggle with a left-handed bow since it’s naturally awkward with everything from trying to get the muscle memory thing going , using a release, and all the way through to holding the bow and then the whole eye thing.

I did initially get him a right-handed bow and discovered from the eye doctor that he was left eye dominant, so I then swapped that for the left-handed bow. He seems to do better and is more consistent with the right-handed bow, but I’m worried that I’m going to jack him up in the future. I thought we had this solved for him, but we went shooting a few days back and no matter what we did he was consistently way off to the right or left with no clear explanation as I even put a few arrows through his bow.

The boy is starting to get pretty discouraged now. Should I keeping pushing the left-handed bow on him or let him decide? Arizona Archery did an awesome job getting my oldest squared away a few years back with a bow and a few private lessons; he is just getting to a point to hopefully take a buck this year. Then again my oldest didn’t have the challenges that my youngest is dealing with.

 

Any thoughts or experiences?

 

-Thanks

[Lucafu1]

My wife is right handed and left eye dominant and naturally shoots everything left handed. I am right handed and left eye dominant and naturally shoot everything right (but I can shoot left also). I forced myself in the army to use my right eye because I didn't want to shoot lefty. The only issue I have is when it come to pistol (I either need to close my left eye or cock my head to the right and use my left eye). He may be too young to have control right now but if it really is awkward (as it was for me) I would keep him using his right. Cover his left eye to help him. 

[latinheat]

Hello,

My son was/is left eye dominant. He is absolutely right handed. I changed his starter bow to left handed when he was about 9 years old. It did not help and he got discouraged as well.

I switched him back to a dedicated right handed bow. He is now 13 and He shoots it just fine and is no longer discouraged. My experience showed that if he was right handed, he would train himself out of his eye dominance. It worked. I'm not an expert and your situation sounds different so my reply is simply for consideration of interest.

[az_runner]

Yeah, I really appreciate the feedback from you guys. I may just bring him back to a right handed bow, lay both in front of him while shooting and see where he can progress. I see where people say that the "supposed to or recommended" is not a solution for all. I think his confidence and comfort level may help push him to go right handed and learn just close the left eye. 

[Heat]

Same deal with my wife, right handed left eye dominant. She has to shoot left handed. Needs a lot of time on the range since doing it lefty is not natural to her. She does OK but I don't think she will be winning any competitions anytime soon.