Princess Ears

Our appt. with Hearts for Hearing was Friday morning at 10:30. Matt took the day off work and we arranged to have Darby go to school and my mom to care for her after that. I found myself in a horrible mood by the time Matt got home from work on Thursday. I was short with the kids and generally a little mean. Around 7 I told Matt I was going for a walk and left him with the girls. As soon as I stepped outside I realized my mood was caused by a deep feeling of dread.

Here we had this gorgeous, innocent, precious little girl on a path of "normalcy" only to discover she was no longer on that path. She was on a different path. The finality of actually getting the hearing aids was what made it seem so real all of the sudden. I walked over to my mom's house and had a good cry to get it out of my system. My mom, as always, was wonderful and sympathetic, and said the right things. I felt much better after that and returned home to finish off my duties as a mom for the night. (As a side note, I also realized I had broken out in hives from either the worry or the stress. They are gone today.)

We got up Friday morning and hit the road around 8:15. Georgia was really excited about he trip and about being alone with her mommy and daddy for a whole day. Honestly, sometimes all of us need a break from "The Destructor" (Darby). We got to HFH at about 10 and were obviously early. We chanced it and went in hoping maybe they were ready for us and they were not. Finally at 11 the speech pathologist took us back and spent about an hour testing G and getting an idea of where she is developmentally speech-wise. We were really please to find out both her expressive and receptive speech are at or above her age level. We were also told that if her hearing loss was progressive and she eventually went deaf, with cochlear implants, she could always be audio/verbal (meaning we wouldn't have to rely on sign language).

The audiologist finally came in and said that the aids they were fitting Georgia with with the first pair of a new generation (Oticon Safari 600) and that the software was giving them a problem. She suggested we take a lunch break and they would call us when they were ready for us. That was fine because I was starving (as usual) and G needed a break. We were right by Penn Square Mall so we headed over there for lunch and running around.

They called us at about 2:00 when we had just gotten in the car to find a park so we headed back to get our new hearing aids. Georgia was very excited, even though I don't think she fully understood what hearing aids meant. I should mention that I felt great the whole day. I never came close to a breakdown or even crying. The people at HFH were so nice and reassuring, by this time I was as excited as Georgia to get her new aids.

The fitting was pretty uneventful except for the fact that G wouldn't wear the hearing aids. This was no surprise to me, but the people there said most kids walk out with them on. Georgia was tired and ready to be home so we put the hearing aids in her case and headed back to Tulsa at about 3:30. Once we got G set up with a DVD and were on the turnpike she said she wanted to wear her new hearing aids. So Matt, who had never put her hearing aids on, climbed in the back seat and put them in her ears. She kept them in all the way home and half-way there even said "I like my new hearing aids. They make me hear so much better."

As soon as we got home she took them out and didn't put them back in until we read books before bedtime. I have to go take care of the kids now but I will try to post birthday pics and trip pics tonight and update how we did with our hearing aids this weekend.