What Is Wrong With Hazel From 'OutDaughtered'? What We Know

Publish date: 2024-05-05

What is wrong with Hazel from ‘OutDaughtered’? Here's what you need to know about the medical condition of one of the quints.

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And we'll be the first to admit that telling quints apart is no small feat. Honestly, it's hard enough for us to tell siblings apart when they're not identical. But there is one Busby quint who stands out more than the rest, and that's adorable glasses-wearing Hazel.

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What is wrong with Hazel from OutDaughtered? The quint has a vision condition. 

Hazel's glasses are more than just fashionable accessories, though. They help correct her nystagmus, a vision condition in which eyes make repetitive uncontrolled movements. The movements can result in reduced vision and depth perception and can affect balance and coordination, according to the American Optometric Association.

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Many of those who have Hazel's vision condition discover it around the time that she did, as the medical problem most often develops by 2 or 3 months of age. 

As we saw on the show, Hazel had to get eye surgery back in 2016. Mom Danielle explained, "This surgery fix is not even about her vision."

"It's more so to correct the placement of where her eye goes to focus better so she doesn't have to turn her neck, which is a huge deal," she continued. And Danielle knows that nystagmus is something with "no official cure" that Hazel "was born with and she'll have it for the remainder of her life."

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"It's inevitable that one day she'll have another," Danielle said in an interview with Us Weekly of Hazel's eye surgery. "So we visit her eye doctors every couple months."

Danielle calls Hazel her most "independent" daughter.

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While Danielle is cool, calm, and collected about Hazel's eye condition, dad Adam has been a bit more nervous throughout the years.

After all, it's no surprise to anyone who follows the devout dad on Instagram that Hazel and he get probably the most one-on-one time. When they went in for Hazel's initial surgery, he was all but freaking out at the 1-in-100,000 odds of permanent vision loss. 

"To most people, that would sound like, 'Man, that's pretty good odds,'" he said on the show at the time. "But then whenever you think of our situation, our chance of having all-girl quintuplets was 1 in 64 million, so odds don't really do it for us now."

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Although as a toddler, Hazel was a bit physically delayed compared to her sisters, it seems like the 4-year-old has caught up and might even be brighter than some of her other quints.

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Danielle, who hasn't updated her blog much, took the time to post last year after the girls' first day of pre-K. After a series of aptitude tests that Danielle was fretting over, worrying that the preemies might be developmentally delayed, Hazel pretty much aced them all. 

She even finished the long series of questions by asking her teacher why there were so many questions — what a sharp little girl! Danielle chose to pair off the other quints for pre-K and put "miss independent Hazel" in a class without her sisters.

"Hazel is so independent and could care less if her sisters are in the same room as her," Danielle said about her fierce 4-year-old. "She is super social and confident, she will do amazing meeting new friends."

We're sure of it — Hazel is incredibly precious! See the quints shine on OutDaughtered, Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on TLC.

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