As I have mention a few times before, this summer Miss Kat and I will be heading to St. Louis to attend Central Institute for the Deaf's summer program. I could not be more excited about it! Last year we attended the John Tracy Clinic and Miss Kat made wonderful progress. I also learned a lot, and was refreshed and ready to use the skills I had learned with Miss Kat all year long. While John Tracy Clinic provides all it's services to families free of charge, CID is a private school and does have tuition. But it is one of CID's goals to be able to provide services to ALL deaf children, regardless of their ability to pay. So, we will be having to travel MANY miles, rent another place to live for 5 weeks, (and all the expenses that come with travel), AND pay the nearly $3000 for tuition. (Oh, and I work for a school and don't get paid for the three months that we aren't in session) BUT, then on Monday the program coordinater called me. The scholarship commitee met and they had awarded us a HUGE scholoarship! We will be paying less than $200 to attend (and that includes all the field trips!)!!!
I am so thankful to CID, it's donors and supporters! They are truly making it possible for Miss Kat to have this opportunity. We really didn't have any idea how we were going to pull the money together to make this trip happen (meaning we were going to beg, borrow and steal to get it!) No one but other parents can understand why it is so important to us to make sure Miss Kat has these educational opportunities and since we are not ready to pick up and leave our familes to change schools, the summer is the only chance we get.
So, again THANK YOU CID!!! You are making a huge difference in another child's life!!!
(If you can help support CID http://www.cid.edu/SupportCID/SupportCID.aspx or The John Tracy Clinic http://www.johntracyclinic.org/supporting-jtc/index.html)
Kat Reading
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Well, nevermind...
I spoke to our insurance today, and surgery has been postponed. We won't be covered until July 1st, so we had to push back Miss Kat's surgery. We will at CID summer school until July 23rd, so Miss Kat's new implant date is July 28th and activation will (probably, again scheduling issue, we are hoping to move it a little earlier) be August 30th.
I'm pretty disappointed (and I think Miss Kat will be mad about her pillow!) but there is nothing we can do about it. We had the same thing happen with her first CI. We were postponed at the very last minute last time.
Ugh, this whole process is frustrating, but the benefits are so worth it!
I'm pretty disappointed (and I think Miss Kat will be mad about her pillow!) but there is nothing we can do about it. We had the same thing happen with her first CI. We were postponed at the very last minute last time.
Ugh, this whole process is frustrating, but the benefits are so worth it!
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
HUGE News!!!
Miss Kat headed to the audiologist today. She hasn't been hearing as well as she should for the last couple of weeks, so her school audi put her in the booth, and the results were not great. She was hearing at 40 db in the lows...YIKES! So, Daddy and she took the long drive and got her tweaked. She is now back to hearing 15-25 db across the board!
While Miss Kat was in the booth they did her auditory discrimination testing and an unaided audiogram for her hearing aid ear. There was good news and bad news. The good news was that she scored 96% on her Nu Chips and Wipi tests. Not too bad! The bad news is that she has lost more hearing in her unimplanted ear. She is no longer a borderline CI candidate. (Stupid progressive loss, it really is never going to stop until she is at 120+ db....sorry, rant ended)
So, for a comparison I will post her unaided, unimplanted ear and her CI:
-- 250hz 500hz 1000hz 2000hz 4000hz 8000hz
CI- 25 db 25 db 20 db 15 db 20 db 25 db
Ear-50 db 70 db 90 db 90 db 105 db 90 db
That is a huge difference!
So, that brings me to the final, most exciting piece of news.....we have scheduled Miss Kat's bilateral surgery!! Her (tentative because of insurance issues) surgery date is May 19th! We are hoping to get her activated by June 15th because we are headed to CID for summer school! I am so happy that Miss Kat will be able to take advantage of this great opportunity with the benefit of two ear that hear well!!
We are excited and nervous but overall happy. It is so soon, but it needs to be. When we told Miss Kat she was a little worried. She very clearly remembers her last surgery. She said she was worried that it would hurt, and I explained that the doctor would give us medicine for the pain, and that if she hurt, I would give it to her. She also told me that she thought she wouldn't be able to sleep with the big bandage on her head. I told her that she could sleep on the other ear. (I think that she might have thought she was going to have a bandage on both ears, because we said "You'll have two CI's" not "You'll have ANOTHER, second CI, in the other ear". But she is clear on that now.) So, we went to the store and bought a "Hello Kitty" pillow and blanket and I told her that we will give it to her on surgery day (insert "Can I have (my) CI tomorrow?" "No" "WHY NOT??? I NEED my pillow!!" Argh...) So, now she seems to have her questions answered (except for why it isn't sooner) and she is at least willing, if not so excited.
We know this is for the best. She hears so much better with her CI than she ever did with her hearing aid (even when her loss was 20 sloping to 60db, so very long ago). It has open a whole new world of language to her. This is going to be stressful, and hard, but it will be totally worth it!
While Miss Kat was in the booth they did her auditory discrimination testing and an unaided audiogram for her hearing aid ear. There was good news and bad news. The good news was that she scored 96% on her Nu Chips and Wipi tests. Not too bad! The bad news is that she has lost more hearing in her unimplanted ear. She is no longer a borderline CI candidate. (Stupid progressive loss, it really is never going to stop until she is at 120+ db....sorry, rant ended)
So, for a comparison I will post her unaided, unimplanted ear and her CI:
-- 250hz 500hz 1000hz 2000hz 4000hz 8000hz
CI- 25 db 25 db 20 db 15 db 20 db 25 db
Ear-50 db 70 db 90 db 90 db 105 db 90 db
That is a huge difference!
So, that brings me to the final, most exciting piece of news.....we have scheduled Miss Kat's bilateral surgery!! Her (tentative because of insurance issues) surgery date is May 19th! We are hoping to get her activated by June 15th because we are headed to CID for summer school! I am so happy that Miss Kat will be able to take advantage of this great opportunity with the benefit of two ear that hear well!!
We are excited and nervous but overall happy. It is so soon, but it needs to be. When we told Miss Kat she was a little worried. She very clearly remembers her last surgery. She said she was worried that it would hurt, and I explained that the doctor would give us medicine for the pain, and that if she hurt, I would give it to her. She also told me that she thought she wouldn't be able to sleep with the big bandage on her head. I told her that she could sleep on the other ear. (I think that she might have thought she was going to have a bandage on both ears, because we said "You'll have two CI's" not "You'll have ANOTHER, second CI, in the other ear". But she is clear on that now.) So, we went to the store and bought a "Hello Kitty" pillow and blanket and I told her that we will give it to her on surgery day (insert "Can I have (my) CI tomorrow?" "No" "WHY NOT??? I NEED my pillow!!" Argh...) So, now she seems to have her questions answered (except for why it isn't sooner) and she is at least willing, if not so excited.
We know this is for the best. She hears so much better with her CI than she ever did with her hearing aid (even when her loss was 20 sloping to 60db, so very long ago). It has open a whole new world of language to her. This is going to be stressful, and hard, but it will be totally worth it!
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