JTC Week 2

The weekend following Week 1 was full of fun adventures including the afore-blogged-about aquarium trip, a huggy-sendoff for Gramma M. at LAX (we miss you already), an afternoon at the beach with Gramma R and Papa T, an over-nighter at their house, and the annual JTC picnic. I don't know how my brain will be able to retain all of the fun stuff we are doing along with the academic learning - but maybe this blog will help me categorize, look back, and remember. Speaking of this blog....just how many of you are out there reading anyway? Could you do me a favor and either comment on or check a reaction box to this post? Thanks.

Gramma R took some really wonderful photos of the four of us on the beach. Here is one of my favorites, and I'll get the rest up in a web folder sometime soon and let you all know when I do. Thanks Gramma for these images; they are priceless!

I was fighting a throat and ear bug over the weekend, and it continued to drag me down through today - poor Paige had to accompany me to urgent care and then the pharmacy this morning so I could finally treat my ear infection. Yep...MY ear got infected. Plugged up. Couldn't hear a thing. Now on amoxicillin and things are looking up.

The first two days this week have featured some extreme highs and lows in the hearing loss information arena. On Monday, Sky had her first full audiological evaluation at JTC. The team is VERY good, reports Jim, who was observing Sky in the booth. She did awesome, powering through an expanded range of frequency testing for both ears without getting tired or frustrated. It helped that it was 9 am and she got princess stickers AND nail polish.

The low came when we saw the results; there has been a 20 dB drop in some frequencies of Skylar's hearing since her ABR last November. This means her hearing loss is progressing, as we feared it would, leading to all kinds of questions and emotions about what to prepare for, how to prepare, and what to do. Could she lose the rest of her hearing soon? How low will it get? Will she need CI's? Do we want them for her? The amazing thing about JTC is that the very next day, today, the director and surgeon from House Ear Institute came to lecture on that very topic. Jim recorded the audio for me since I was with Paige. But first things first: the JTC audiologist turned up the power on her HA's and Sky appears to be noticing more quiet and distinct sounds as a result. We will need to monitor the new settings and ask her about what she's hearing over the next several days.

The high came today, when we met with Charissa, the AVT/Speech therapist. Charissa has been doing language assessments with Skylar, and is not done yet, but shared some initial results with us today. On the preschool language scale test (PLS-5), Skylar answered a series of questions related to auditory comprehension and scored above her chronological age as compared to her hearing peers. More specifically, she scored at the 57th percentile for kids her age (4 yrs 1 mo), putting her age equivalency at 4 yrs 3 mos. This bit of news validates the rapid progress we all know she has been making since she received her hearing aids last August. If she had taken this test back then I know she would have scored well below kids her age in comprehension. To see that she is not only caught up in this area, but slightly above average as compared to her *hearing* peers almost made me burst into tears.

Another good thing, and this one is growing in its goodness, is that through all of the new information, a-ha moments, and scary tests, there are inspirational stories and really good new friends. JTC does a fabulous job of helping the summer session families create a community. Tomorrow I'm looking forward to hearing from a panel of deaf adults. In the evening, all of the families are meeting for pizza night in the lounge. Yes, I helped organize it. :-)