By: Dawn Thompson
When our little boy was 6 years old, I handed him the phone to talk to his grandmother. When Dylan said, “Hello?… Hello?…There’s no on there!” I didn’t think to much about it until I took the phone back and could clearly hear my mother speaking. I gave it back to him and insisted he try again. He switched the phone to his other ear and excitedly had a conversation. When he hung up, I whispered something into his right ear and he said, “What?” I whispered even louder and the little chap had no idea what I was saying.
We took him to the pediatrician who cleaned his ears out and teased him about having bunnies stuck in them. To no avail, we were referred to the audiologist. After a complete exam, we were saddened to learn our little boy had lost most of the useful hearing in his right ear. This was especially tough since he already had complex vision losses and relied heavily on his hearing.
By age eight, the nerve had died leaving him deaf on that side. Even though he still had one “good ear” he had very poor word recognition in adverse listening situations such as public places, restaurants and school. He was fitted for a personal FM system to help him distinguish speech in the classroom and, for the most part, it worked great. Although it brought the teachers voice clearly to his only working ear, it cut out ALL other sounds, including the voices of other children and his other teachers. Dylan didn’t like feeling excluded from other sounds and expressed that it made him feel completely deaf most of the time except when the teacher was speaking.
For two whole years we tried to get him to wear it and every day he complained. Our team finally realized that Dylan would not give up and we decided, neither would we! In September, Dylan’s team contacted audiology and proposed a few different ideas for a new ear piece and mold. They failed a few times, but yesterday the hearing teacher called to tell me they did it! They created an earpiece that lets other sounds come to his working ear while keeping the teacher’s voice most prominent. For Dylan, this is nothing short of a miracle. It just goes to show you, never give up hope.
He is getting ready to celebrate his 11th birthday on March 22nd. He will be discharged from the hospital on March 9th and will have two weeks to heal from his feeding tube surgery before the BIG celebration. He has lots to be thankful for this year and a lot to look forward to, and he knows it!
