Mouldy Ears...

It seems like this whole process has taken a lifetime, but really it has only been almost 2 mos. That is almost the length of time Sydney has been on this earth. She has no clue what's been going on, and to her this is normal, but to me it has been torture. From all the reading I've been doing about hearing loss in infants it is critical to get them fitted with hearing aids ASAP. The sooner the auditory nerve is stimulated the better chances they have for developing natural speech. Otherwise their brain will just map to use the other senses. They don't really start counting her speech development until she is fitted with hearing aids.

We finally met with her audi that would be fitting her with hearing aids (H.A.). It was a much anticipated visit. I asked her a ton of questions. The most important what will she be able to hear with the H.A's and will she develop natural speech. She says she should be able to hear birds and yes she has a good chance of hearing all the sounds she needs to develop natural speech. If you look at the audiogram I posted earlier it will show where on the different letters in speech fall according to volume and pitch and it also shows where different sounds fall.

We decided on getting the Phonak Nios Micro V H.A.'s. We chose the purple translucent H.A.'s for her. We want her to be proud of who she is. The audi had to take moulds of her ears by shooting silicone into her ears. These get sent off to a lab to make custom ear moulds for her. The H.A.'s are programmed for her specific loss so she can get the best sounds possible. But H.A.'s are not like eyeglasses. Hearing loss can distort sound and these are just amplfying distorted sound. It is also hard for hard of hearing (HOH) to focus on one person when people are talking in the background etc. FM system can help with this by allowing a teacher or parent to directly link into the H.A.'s so their voice in at a higher volume than the backgound noise. Speech therapy and the Early Start program also help with this as well. So now we have to wait another month before she actually receives her H.A.'s. Since I am behind on my blogging, this will be next week. I am excited and sad at the same time. Excited to see her reaction to sound and sad that this is going to be more of a reality for us.