One Door Closing ...

Butters in Chapel Hill, NC

Butters had his last hearing booth test yesterday before his implant surgery next month.  He did well but his results were about the same with dips down to the 100 DB range.  So yeah, this was more justification for getting the CIs. 

We are really going to miss our audiologist who has been there with us through this journey from the very beginning - back in May 2012.  I cannot believe how fast the time has gone and how the surgery date is just over the horizon.  Holy Beejeezus.

Butters will have one ear done this go around and we are not sure which one it will be.  Hopefully, if insurance is obliging, we can go ahead and get the other ear done by the end of the year.  Our insurance likes to see how they do with one ear first before going bilateral.  Understood.  Get the point.  I am picking my battles carefully at this point since there are so many irons in the fire and honestly, I am exhausted. My fighting Irish heritage spirit has been put through the wringer lately.

Have the hearing aids been worth it?  Certainly.  I realize that with his severe to profound level, it's likely that he probably couldn't hear much of our speech sounds, but he was hearing many environmental and loud speech sounds and that's what counts.  Those hearing booth tests demonstrated that - every single one of them - 5 in all.  

He will go bimodal until he goes bilateral, so we won't be rid of the "ears" just yet.  But it has been a good run with them despite all of that space alien-sounding feedback, dropping one in the sink, and then the latest trip through the rinse cycle of the washing machine - and yet they keep on going.  Yes, those hearing aids keep coming back for more,  no matter what those things go through.  Kind of like a bad horror movie, actually.