Hard of Hearing / Accepting Your Child’s Hearing Loss—Ok, a bit of a rant!

[Guest guest]

Discovering that our 48hr old newborn " failed " her hearing screening

test was a stunner. However, more stunning was the medical

community's inability to pin point our daughter's exact loss or its

cause. We kept getting comments like, " your daughter has two

attractive parents, she just gonna be a looker " --Uhh? Here we are

trying to figure out if she has a syndormic loss, LVAS, etc and the

attitude we got from the audis and specialists was just slap hearing

aids on the kid and wait and see.

Finally, we met with the Head of Head and Neck Surgery at UCLA and

he said what we suspected --they just don't know all that much

about SNHL. We have undergone the genetic Connex. 26 & 30 tests,

which came out " normal. " We are in the process of scheduling a

urinary ultrasound and EKG for our daughter, as we discovered that

these tests are important from a genetics specialist -- at least we

feel like we are doing something.

As for the BTE hearing aids -- they are tough. Aside from getting

them to stay on, they look painful (heavy behind the ear) and I

believe are unattractive. Will I grow to embrace them? –of course.

I understand that kids pick-up on the attitudes of their parents—

that said, on this rainy night, on this parents site, I confess I

hate them. I don't understand why Hearing aid companies can't make

an " in the canal " aid with a silicone shell that could easily be

sized as necessary, much like the ear molds.