Who Knew??

Add this to the list of things that you learn when you have a child with a hearing loss......they can be allergic to the hearing aid mold.

Jared had oral surgery 3 weeks ago, the next day he started what we thought was an ear infection.  Because it was Saturday I had to take him to The Little Clinic in our local Krogers store.  They have him the standard pink stuff and sent us on our way.  It cleared the infection( or so we thought) for about a week or so and then it came back with a vengeance.  Jared's ear was red, itchy, his ear canal swelled and he had drainage.  A call to his ENT was in order, we have a great ENT who got us right in( even though they were scheduled out until Jan).  We saw him yesterday and let me just say.....YUCK!  I will not gross you all out( in case some of you are eating as you read this) with all the details.  The first thought was the oral surgery, they had to go up into his palate to get the extra tooth out and it messed up the eustachian tubes, but after the doctor looked in his other ear and noticed the same redness he decided that Jared was allergic to the hearing aid mold.  His left ear was not nearly as bad as the right, but it was heading that way.  So he is on another antibiotic and ear drops( oh joy!) for 10 days.  We head to the audiologist next week to get a new set of ear molds made.  Hopefully we can put a rush on them because of his allergy. 

Update on Allison

Allison saw her wonderful audiologist on Monday.  She did great, these appointments are becoming old hat for Allison, so she knew what to expect and how long they will last.  It is wonderful that Allison can answer the questions asked to her and can tell Miss Cindi if something sounds too loud, to soft or just right.  Allison was able to share all the wonderful things that happen at school and tell about her SLP, FM system and such.  All this is made possible because of the wonders of the CI.

After testing her implants to make sure all was up to snuff, we headed to the sound booth.  This was the 1st time that Allison was alone in the booth and did a great job, she clicked away using the clicker and once again she was at 15-20 dB's in both ears.  They also tested Allison live voice recognition.
She scored 72% words and 62/75 phonemes in her right ear( a great improvement from previous testing) and 92% words and 73/75 phonemes in her left ear.  YAY, we finally got her right ear and left ear to the same place. 

Oh and on another note( pun intended)  Allison will be starting piano lessons soon. Yes you read that right.......our deaf daughter who hears with Cochlear implants will be starting piano lessons.  She is so exited about it.  Now if we can figure out where we are going to put the piano in our house.  Only time will tell how far Allison will go with this, but if her commitment to piano is anything like her commitment to hearing and talking, you can expect Allison to be playing in Carnage Hall in the near future.  :-)