Screeching. Really Loud Screeching

If he looks tired to you, it's probably because he was up at five a.m screeching in his crib

"Every morning, sometime around five, I'll hear a couple of thumping sounds in the hallway.  It gets quiet for a few minutes and then this loud, piercing shriek happens."

Nope, this isn't an episode of Ghost Hunters.  It's a snippet of the phone conversation I had with my mom yesterday about how typical mornings usually go around here lately.

For the past few days, Butters has been enjoying screeching at the top of his lungs.  This also occurred during a short phase that happened for a few weeks before he got his implant, when his audiologist turned up the volume to maximum with his hearing aids.  So it isn't like it's something completely out of the ordinary for him.  It's still a little jarring to our nerves... and ears.

He received four new programs last week as is the standard when we go for our monthly implant check-ups.  No biggie.  He usually moves up to the first new program by the end of the week.  This kid has not been intimidated by any sounds.  As a matter of fact, this kid has not been intimidated by anything so far.  I moved him up to program two last Friday and he did fine.  Well, Sunday evening, hubbers happened to check the remote and asked me when Butters got moved up to program three.  "He didn't,"  I responded hesitantly.  We both looked at the remote, and indeed it glowed "3" on the screen.   Holy crap!  Hubbers then informed me that he thought that perhaps he had accidentally moved him up when he turned on the button to the processor that morning when he got Butters up from his morning break.  It's happened before with me as well since it's pretty easy to do.  There are two buttons on the N5, one at the very top of the processor switches from program to program.  It's the button almost a millimeter down from the top that turns the processor on.

We noticed late that afternoon that Butters would screech every so often.  He didn't seem to be doing it out of frustration or pain.  He seemed to be doing it out of curiosity.  I'm at the sink, washing dishes and I almost drop and shatter a glass because here comes this "EEEEHHHHH."  I turn the corner and see Butters with this look on his face like, "Wow!  Did you hear that?"  It's a little similar to the second, shorter You Tube videos of his activation.  He's sitting on the floor with me, hubbers, our audi, and one of our AVT's.  We are all talking to him, he is pondering the situation and suddenly, "AAAAAHHHHH,"  and he looks around in wonder at his own voice.  It's wonderful, really.  No, seriously, we couldn't be more happy that he can hear his own voice now.  It would just be ever so lovely if he preferred his "Inside Voice" instead.

 Activation Day

So fast forward to today, almost a week later.  He is still screeching and my nerves are hanging by a thread since he is doing it A LOT and it doesn't seem to be entertaining him like it had before.  Now he seems irked.  And he seems to be teething again.  He has teeth coming out on all four sides, by the way.  Oh yeah, and it's still a pain in the butt to get him to wear his left hearing aid too.  He loves his implant, and he will even reach around to the back of his head to grab the magnet when it falls off, but he has had enough of the hearing aid.  I kind of feel the same way.  It still takes me forever to wedge the damn thing into his ear, probably because he is trying to run away from me when he sees me coming towards him with it in my hand, and also because the ear mold is about seven months old.

I bumped him back down to program 2, and he seems to be doing slightly better, but he will still let out a screech occasionally.  And really, like I mentioned before, he does it when he wakes up in the morning and his ears definitely aren't in at that time.  

It's a little disconcerting, but I'm thinking that he just wasn't quite ready to move up to that new program yet, combined with teething.  He woke up crying this morning at 1:30 with his hand in his mouth.  

We will try him again this weekend on program 3 and see how he does.  This is a loud and super active little guy.  He is constantly "talking," and is constantly on the go until you force him to take a nap.  By one in the afternoon, he looks tired around the eyes and he wobbles while he is walking, but he has that "No, No, I'm good" attitude.

He just might end up forcing me into a retirement home before I even reach forty.