Can you hear me now?
Isaac was born early and under very hard conditions. You can read most of the details here. We had to make many hard decisions and face many hard realities when he was born. We were told that he would likely have a variety of issues that might present themselves as a result of his premature birth and the subsequent treatment to save his life.
His hearing aids came in a cool box!
As it turns out, Isaac does have one issue that resulted from some of his treatments. During his time in the NICU when he was most critical, we had to sign several releases acknowledging that some of the meds they were giving Isaac may result in his being deaf. In fact, he does have moderate hearing loss in both ears and it centers around higher frequencies…right where most voices tend to fall. As you can imagine, that makes school and sports teams and even home life sort of interesting.
You can barely see the wire into his ear
Now Isaac has never been a particularly organized kid. He loses his shoes almost daily. Sometimes he even misplaces his toothbrush if you can imagine. We were hesitant to get him hearing aids when he was younger for that reason. Now that he is in middle school though, he seems to be rounding the corner on keeping track of himself. The school situation was becoming more of an issue as well. The county had been making accommodations for him and provided in-school sound systems in his classrooms but it became hard to manage and he didn’t enjoy the extra attention that went along with it.
The only visible part and he may just grow his hair out some
So, we decided it was time to do something. Last week, Isaac was fitted for new hearing aids for both ears. They are very inconspicuous and work super well. I think the best thing was when we first walked outside from the doctor’s office. The office is near an interstate and Isaac stepped out and immediately looked around, sort of confused. He asked me what the hum was. He was truly shocked and neither of us realized how much he had been missing…I only wish his first “sound realization” had been something other than the traffic noise from the interstate. Still, it sort of made me happy just to see that he was finally going to hear like me!
This entry was posted in Awesome, Family, Technology and tagged Awesome, Family, Technology by warren
How amazing what they can do today. The hearing aids really are quite invisible. To be able to hear all the sweet noises of bird singing, bees buzzing, etc. How wonderful for Isaac.
I hope Isaac has many more good listening experiences.
Wow, what an incredible story and one that I just read for the first time. From what I’ve heard, they have made great strides in the field of hearing in recent years. Sometime recently I saw a video of a girl that they did a surgery on that allowed her to hear for the very first time.
Although Isaac doesn’t know it yet, there are benefits to having the removable kind of hearing aids. I’ve seen my grandfather do this. He removes them while watching sports on television and just turns the volume up so he doesn’t hear my grandmother asking him to do things. Quite clever he is.
A rough start. Goodness, that must have caused a great deal of anguish.
And how awesome… the innovations that kept him alive, and are restoring something lost! Makes me smile thinking of the many ways this will enrich his life. Very cool.
How exciting for him! Reminds me of when I was in 8th grade and got glasses. I walked outside and said, “Hey! I can see the leaves on the trees!”
Good for Isaac!!!!!!!
I could barely even SEE the wire and I was looking hard!
Now he can tune you out like a regular teenager!
Hooray for Isaac! Hope the hearing aids bring him much joy.
So happy for him! I hope he finds great joy in his new found hearing possibilities. I also hope the kids at school don’t hassle him for wearing them. I’m guessing he’ll keep his hair a bit long around his ears for the time being.
Along the same lines, but only because of bad genes, when I got glasses for the first time (in 3rd grade), I exclaimed, “There’s LEAVES on the trees, Mom!” upon leaving the eye clinic.
Senses are awesome, aren’t they?