Ill take what i can get.....

I wonder some days what it would be like to hear very little. Sometimes I just sit there thinking about what things would be different in your life? Even attempting to block my ears with my fingers feels weird. Have you ever done it long enough to notice what you really hear? I know i cant hear a great deal, but mostly i know its not clear. The workings of the ear has completely taken me in. I find myself constantly googling things about hearing impairment & how the cochlea works. Things i would have previously shrugged off. This has become a huge part of our life now. One that im finding extremely interesting & more importantly more comfortable with. There truly is a big wide world of technology & medical advances to help those with disabilites. Savannah is lucky to be born in the 20th century.

I went into our appointment today with a totally open mind, thinking that whatever happens with the testing happens. As long as the ears havent gotten worse then i cant complain right?

I really had to hold my nervousness in as i really didnt want to get my hopes up. But secretly i felt confident. Dont get me wrong i do understand that she will have damage no matter what, but even a slight 10bd change can make the world of difference!

Because savannah was now over 3mth, they can no longer do the ABR test on her unless they sedate her, and really whats the point? Australian hearing have a really great way to determine what children can really hear. As explained to me this test isnt usually conducted untill the child is sitting & usually at 6-7mths old. But she wanted to determine that what we had seen last appt & what i had been noticing over the previous weeks with her right ear (profound ear) was actually happening & not a part of my imagination! LOL

The ran a serious of beep tests from 0-110 decibels. Then tested each decibel for tone which is from 250hz-4000hz.

Just to quickly tell you, when you are diagnosed with moderate-severe deafness it also means you are usually tone deaf too. If you remember the graph i posted in my first blog speech sits at different tones on the chart. For the most part people with hearing loss have high pitch deafness as well. So along with the original diagnosis they also wont have the high pitch tones which are the constants (ie S,f,sh etc).
It can play a major part in their speech learning, which i never knew. I needed to know so that taralye could work around that & teach her how to understand those.

I was pretty much blown from my chair when she told me savannah isn't pitch deaf at all! Yep that's when i fell off my chair! This was the first of our amazing news for the day!!!!!!
Basically it means she is moderate-severe & that's it!!!! she can hear anything from 65bs upwards & from 250hz-4000hz! YIPPEEEE & i thought this day couldn't get any better! :)

So back to the testing, i was holding savannah whilst they had another audiologist analysing her responses to the sounds sent to her right ear.
I'm glad i couldn't see her face because it made me fell like i wasn't going to see something they may not have. This was their job their profession & they knew what they where looking for!

The test didn't go for long because it was only one ear, but when i saw the result card i was absolutely shocked! not only did she actually hear some of the sounds once again she isn't tone deaf in the right ear! Hey she isn't even completely deaf in that ear like first thought! i swear i was ready to shout out "HALLELUJAH"

She explained further that because of her age, the reading is only what they perceived she was hearing, babies tend not to respond to soft noises because they are still so young, and in savannahs case she wasn't even meant to be doing this test.
So she was steady hearing at 90db which is still boarder line profoundness...BUT its a massive improvement & she believes that as she gets older & more alert, she will be able to give us a better ready of what she is actually hearing. Their where other beep marks on the chart at lower dbs but as she said, they cant draw anything on that as its not consistent enough.

I'm not greedy ill take whatever i can get! And today we where really blessed to have had these small BUT amazing results for her! Especially on the tone front! OMG how amazing is that she can actually hear ALL the pitches!

That was basically it for the testing & then we went onto the normal appt things like moulds & her new responses & noises etc...
The last 3 weeks savannah has found her aides & has enjoyed taking the little buggers out constantly & throwing them thinking that she is cool...lol
The audiologist really couldn't believe that she was doing this at 3.5 mths! they have never had a baby so young pull them out like this intentionally! They average age of exploring them & finding the aides is between 7-9 mths. So we are sure that savannah is going to be quite the smarty pants ;)
we where given a pilot cap to keep the aides on & we happened to be the first to trial it. At first i was not even going to put the thing on her head it looked SOOOOOOOO UGLY! LOL
but you know what savannah makes it look ADORABLE! this kid makes having hearing loss fashionable as i like to say..lol


So at this point in her long journey I'm extremely happy that we are making even the smallest progress. I only pray we can make it to where both her ears have a fighting chance to hear the world as we know it. Just keep your fingers crossed for us because i know that ALL the support you've given so far has really helped & those prayers are being continuously answered! Its become quite clear this cheeky little girl is definately here for a purpose & a very big one at that...she is such a special lil thing.

xo