Gray's Trip to the Audiologist and other horror stories.
One year ago today, Grayson was evaluated by Help Me Grow for his speech delay. He was just shy of 19 months old, and I was 36 weeks and 6 days pregnant with Easton.
A lot has happened in a year.
We have seen a lot of improvement in Grayson's speech because he is talking now. Only we don't know what he is saying, but he has inflection and sometimes replies to us when we ask a question. Again, it is not always clear what he is trying to communicate. I thought we would be further in progress at this point - that he would be talking up a storm, but that is not the case. He has a vocabulary of words that he uses appropriately, so I do think some improvement has been made.
So we press on.
Today he went to the audiologist for his hearing test. Mike was working - never again will I attempt to even think about taking one of our sons to a specialist without Mike's being able to join us. We will work around his crazy schedule if we need too. However, my very sweet friend Stevie came with us to the appointment, and I am SO GLAD. I cannot even put into words just how thrilled I was to have her company. She is a preschool teacher who specializes in kids with special needs, so she knew JUST how to handle and interact with Grayson. She was a God-send. Truly.
If you remember, my very very good friend Mary Ann joined me for Grayson's first hearing test that had disastrous results. It was my birthday, and we had just gotten word that Mike's grandma had died - and frankly, I was a MESS already. She was an awesome support to me that day.
I gotta say. I am so thankful for my incredible friends!
Back to today. Grayson did not do great. There was a lot of flailing around because under no circumstances did he want someone to look in his ears. I do not blame him. In the last eight weeks he has had two ear infections and at least 5 doctors looking in his ears causing him great discomfort - AND he had his ears irrigated which was so traumatic I have tried to block it out of my memory. *sigh*
The audiologist - who was fantastic by the way - tried to measure the movement of Grayson's ear drums but she was not able to do that because the boy would not hold still and just cried and cried. No I am sorry. He screamed and screamed. And screamed some more. He fought us tooth and nail. So we took a break from that and stepped into the sound proof room. He struggled to get out of my arms the whole time and cried and screamed, but he still responded to the testing which showed that he can hear. Only because he refused the ear drum test it is not completely clear if he can hear out of both ears. I am guessing he can though.
Once we got out of the sound proof room and the audiologist put her equipment away, Grayson was a happy camper. Stevie thought he did well but she looked at it from this perspective - he's two. We got him in the building and into the office. We got to talk to the audiologist and we did get some results like he can hear! So it really was a successful trip. She reminded me of this a couple times, and I was so grateful for her fresh perspective.
I needed some retail therapy after that so we went to Target, and then we hit up Coldstone because we needed to celebrate surviving one heck of a day. Bed time was not a fight tonight because my Gray was so exhausted.
Who knows where we will be one year from now! Will I look back and shake my head at his antics and have a three - almost four year old! - talking up a storm? Or will we be about where we are right now with some progress? Hard to say.
A lot has happened in a year.
We have seen a lot of improvement in Grayson's speech because he is talking now. Only we don't know what he is saying, but he has inflection and sometimes replies to us when we ask a question. Again, it is not always clear what he is trying to communicate. I thought we would be further in progress at this point - that he would be talking up a storm, but that is not the case. He has a vocabulary of words that he uses appropriately, so I do think some improvement has been made.
So we press on.
Today he went to the audiologist for his hearing test. Mike was working - never again will I attempt to even think about taking one of our sons to a specialist without Mike's being able to join us. We will work around his crazy schedule if we need too. However, my very sweet friend Stevie came with us to the appointment, and I am SO GLAD. I cannot even put into words just how thrilled I was to have her company. She is a preschool teacher who specializes in kids with special needs, so she knew JUST how to handle and interact with Grayson. She was a God-send. Truly.
If you remember, my very very good friend Mary Ann joined me for Grayson's first hearing test that had disastrous results. It was my birthday, and we had just gotten word that Mike's grandma had died - and frankly, I was a MESS already. She was an awesome support to me that day.
I gotta say. I am so thankful for my incredible friends!
Back to today. Grayson did not do great. There was a lot of flailing around because under no circumstances did he want someone to look in his ears. I do not blame him. In the last eight weeks he has had two ear infections and at least 5 doctors looking in his ears causing him great discomfort - AND he had his ears irrigated which was so traumatic I have tried to block it out of my memory. *sigh*
The audiologist - who was fantastic by the way - tried to measure the movement of Grayson's ear drums but she was not able to do that because the boy would not hold still and just cried and cried. No I am sorry. He screamed and screamed. And screamed some more. He fought us tooth and nail. So we took a break from that and stepped into the sound proof room. He struggled to get out of my arms the whole time and cried and screamed, but he still responded to the testing which showed that he can hear. Only because he refused the ear drum test it is not completely clear if he can hear out of both ears. I am guessing he can though.
Once we got out of the sound proof room and the audiologist put her equipment away, Grayson was a happy camper. Stevie thought he did well but she looked at it from this perspective - he's two. We got him in the building and into the office. We got to talk to the audiologist and we did get some results like he can hear! So it really was a successful trip. She reminded me of this a couple times, and I was so grateful for her fresh perspective.
I needed some retail therapy after that so we went to Target, and then we hit up Coldstone because we needed to celebrate surviving one heck of a day. Bed time was not a fight tonight because my Gray was so exhausted.
Who knows where we will be one year from now! Will I look back and shake my head at his antics and have a three - almost four year old! - talking up a storm? Or will we be about where we are right now with some progress? Hard to say.
I do not blame Grayson for not wanting them to look in his ears! The feeling of an otoscope (or anything!) in my ear just makes me cringe.
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