SOMEONE won't take a nap today!

I won't say WHO...

Anyway, I can't believe the little guy is six months old. SIX months! Where does time go?

I bought him a new "critter clip" to keep his hearing aids from falling off at random intervals. Nolan thinks they make a tasty snack, and his brother thinks they're fun to play with. Most hearing aid clips are sort of "blah," but this company makes really cute ones!

This one, by the way, is called "dogzilla."

March Doesn't Look Any Better Than February...

I was really, really hoping that the doctor appointments would slow down once we hit early March (I only had Nolan's CT scan and six month well-baby visit scheduled). I should have known better!

I went to the ENT today and she checked Nolan's ears for fluid. Apparently, my mantra of "fluid be gone" did no good and he has fluid in his left ear. Since he's had fluid in at least one of his ears since January 9th, and one ear infection to boot, the ENT scheduled same-day surgery on March 27th to place PE tubes. We'll go in on the 26th of March, and if by some great and wonderful miracle the fluid is gone, we'll cancel the surgery. If not, we proceed.

The one thing that makes my mommy-freak-o-meter begin to ring is the fact that Nolan will be sedated twice in a short period of time: once on March 18th for the CT scan and again on March 27th for the PE tubes.

I also had the genetics bloodwork done today- they are testing exactly what I thought they would be testing (thank you, Dr. Google) and his blood has been sent to Boston University for Connexin 26 testing, Connexin 30 testing, and the mitochondrial A1555G mutation testing. It will take 4-6 weeks to get results back, so we should know by about the time Nolan has his tubes placed.

One thing the receptionist at the ENT mentioned was that the guys doing the CT should give us a CD of images, and to bring that to the pre-op appointment on March 26th. Don't think I'm not burning us a copy of that bad boy! Nolan's medical file is beginning to take over the better part of a file cabinet drawer!

The schedule as it now stands:

February 29: Earmold impressions
First week of March: Pick up earmolds
March 7: Nolan's 6 month well-baby check
March 18: CT Scan (sedated)
March 26: ENT appointment
March 27: PE tube placement (sedated)

Maybe April will be a nice, quiet month...

We've Got Goals, Baby!

I had my IFSP meeting for Matthew, and we put goals into place for the next six months. His official diagnosis is a severe articulation disorder with a moderate receptive/expressive language delay. His receptive delay is mild, and probably registered poorly because he was not in the mood to cooperate with the examiner. He didn't show an understanding of pronouns or the correct use for objects (he fed the bear with a spoon in a cup- unfortunately I always use a spoon in my coffee mug and he imitated this. Oops!). His expressive was moderate, his pragmatic use of language was severe, and his articulation was severe. That's the bad news.

The good news? He gets speech therapy, twice per week! His goals for the next six months are:

• Increase core vocabulary


• Demonstrate understanding of pronounds and simple descriptive concepts


• Imitate words


• Produce consonant-vowel combinations


• Decrease frustration when not understood


• Increase amount of signs to match receptive language


• Add consonants to vocabulary


• Increase word approximation consistency


• Increase word clarity

The simple idea of my 2+ year old being able to imitate words has me all a-twitter. I know it is a process, but I really can't wait until he calls me "mama." I've been waiting a long time.

Maybe a Ma?

Nolan was crying last night, and I swear I heard a "Maaaa!" in the cry. The beginning of babble? We shall see!

In the meantime, he gets to chew on his super-yummy flavored tongue depressors, the ultimate reward for him in speech therapy. Nothing can get him to open his mouth in an "aahhh" shape like holding up a piece of cherry flavored wood! Now we just need to get some voluntary sound out of him. He often won't verbalize at all during therapy, and saves his squeals and "AAAAHHH" noises for an hour in which the rest of us would like to be in bed. Kids are strange, strange creatures!

Setting Earmold Records!

I picked up Nolan's 5th set of earmolds on Tuesday. I have a feeling Emtech (earmold company) is regretting their re-make policy by now! The wings are gone, but now there is a gap between the mold and the side of his ear. Darn! We'll be going back on the 29th for new impressions- earmold set number six. Hopefully we'll get a better set this time! In the meantime, I'm having some trouble keeping his aids in (especially the left one). Thank goodness for pilot caps.

The weather was rather miserable (in the teens with high winds), so I didn't venture over to the hospital for the genetics bloodwork. Instead, I will do it the morning of the 27th, since I have to go up for an ENT clinic on that day. Nolan has had fluid in his ears since January 9th (at least) and has had one infection. Hopefully the infection is gone (I'm pretty sure it is) and I hope the fluid is, too!

So the remaining schedule for this week and next is:

Today (the 20th): Speech Therapy and playgroup (I didn't make playgroup)!

Thursday (21st): Pediatrician appointment (check ears) and MOPS

Friday (22nd): Speech Therapy

The weekend: Absolutely NO appointments! Yay!

Monday the 25th: Speech Therapy and EI wrap-up meeting to put Matthew's IFSP into place.

Wednesday the 27th: ENT appointment and genetics bloodwork

Friday the 29th: Earmolds!

Free Magazine

A wonderful lady at my church (who is always giving me issues of her hearing loss magazines) told me about a free magazine subscription. Hearing Health is totally free- I'm going to subscribe. I love information, and free information is even better!

Insurance Approval For Genetics

Hey, an insurance battle I didn't have to fight! We are approved for the genetic testing on Nolan.

I looked up the tests run by Boston University (where Nolan's blood will be sent), and their standard deafness panel consists of: Connexin 26 direct test, Connexin 26 sequencing, Connexin 30 direct test, and Mitochondrial A1555G Mutation.

I'll probably take him up on the 19th for the blood tests, since I have to pick up (what else?) earmolds anyway. This is a case of hurry-up-and-wait, since the tests take 4-6 weeks to process. If there is a positive result, the lab in Boston will call the geneticist. If there is a negative result, then the test data is snail-mailed back to the geneticist. I hope it is one of these, since they are non-syndromic. At least we can rule them in/rule them out!