Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Just When You Start to Worry

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We were starting to get concerned about Nolan's receptive language again, because when you ask him "what does the doggy say?" he'll respond, "doggy say." He doesn't answer the question, but simply imitates the last portion of the question. He still does this, but last night we had a little conversation at the mall that proves his receptive language is coming along just fine.

Me: Nolan, it is time to go home now.

Nolan: Nooooooo!

Me: Yes, we're going out to our car and we're going home.

Nolan: "No! That way! Go that way!" He turned and pointed to the quarter style rides.

OK, it sounded more like: "No! At ee! Dau at ee!" But still, I'm impressed.

I guess his receptive language is really OK after all!

Keeping the hearing aids in is still a major problem. I did call our audiologist to schedule a hearing test, though I don't believe his hearing level has changed. His speech and response level seems to be about the same, so I have a feeling we are simply dealing with a toddler who wants control!

We handle the episodes of aid-yanking very calmly. The first time he pulls them out, we say nothing and replace them immediately. Sometimes he leaves them in for a few more minutes. More often, he yanks them out again. On the second "yank," we check the aids to make sure the battery is working (check for a squeal). then we replace them again. If he yanks them a third time (common), we give him a 10 minute break before replacing them. Some days he will continuously yank them out and nothing will work. Other days he'll finally accept them and we go on with our merry routine. We never get more than 40 minutes of aid-wearing in a row, but hopefully with persistence and patience we'll see more compliance with the aids in a few short months!

2 comments:

Megan said...

Leah, Do you guys have critter clips? I noticed on one of Nolan's pictures you have the clips that have plastic that go around the aide. I found these attachments harder to wear because they push the aide away from the head and make it more likely to slide around. We got the critter clips and the attachment is around the tubing by the ear mold. These seem to bother Luca a lot less and stay on longer.

Luca doesn't say the animal sounds too much either. We have this as one of his goals, but it seems like he's not really into them. He's really into Thomas now, but calls him a car, but he does have the choo-choo down.

leah said...

We have critter clips. The problem with those is that Nolan detaches the earmold and then we lose the BTE portion of the aid (done this more than once). At least with the Oticon clip, the expensive part of the aid is kept. Except now he rips the lanyard off the BTE case, so I suppose it doesn't matter! Sigh...

I'm going to be so happy once he leaves them in his ears!!!