In the last two months, Li'l E has undergone several different evals and consultations with an eye toward assisting her hearing in the educational setting. While I'm not a fan of picturing my Li'l E heading off on a big yellow bus for her first day of kindergarten, (sob!) I am well-aware that planning ahead and gathering the information and doing the research is the best thing I can to do for us to make the decisions that we need to make. (More on the forecasts of what is coming down the pike for our girl at a later date...)
So. While I'm studying up on hearing assistance devices, hearing support and speech support therapies and more, I have a few questions for you, my readers:
Are you a mom of a child with hearing loss?
Are you a reader of a blog written by a mom of a child with hearing loss?
Do you have a hearing loss of your own that you talk about on your blog?
I am looking to create a bit of a network with this information. For now, I don't envision anything more than a special list on my sidebar that connects us all together. To learn from each other, to share resources and information. To support and encourage each other in the parenting of these little treasures. Who knows what might come of it?!
I've already been a long-time reader of 5 Minutes for Mom's excellent sister site, called 5 Minutes for Special Needs. And I've learned a lot, connected with some great folks, and used it as a starting point for other resources that I still enjoy today. But that site is a broad umbrella of all kinds of special needs and I am feeling the desire to hone my focus in the search for connection with other families who are living with varying levels of hearing loss.
If you are in that group, please leave a comment today. If your blog is not accessible via your comment, please consider leaving a link to your blog. If you have any suggestions or resources that are especially helpful for this venture, leave a comment. I'm not quite sure how else to go about creating this network, I just know I'd really like to take a stab at it.
6 comments:
Good morning GM - while I've mentioned it on the blog - it's such a fact of my daily life that I really don't notice it - I suffer from hearing loss!
Without my hearing aids I'm something around 80% deaf - deafness is hard to qualify / quantify. I've been wearing hearing aids for something like 15 years now - and my hearing continues to fade, I will - one day - at least without hearing aids - be profoundly deaf. With hearing aids I'm probably about 90% of normal - missing unique frequencies completely however - so nothing sounds as 'good' to me as it does to you!
Feel free to quiz me to the nth degree - no secrets here - and I'll be happy to talk about it publically or privately.
Of all manor of 'need' I've found deafness easiest to deal with - but lets not forget that I was once of 'normal hearing' and was able to accomplish most of my formal education prior to suffering hearing loss. That gave me a big head start!
hugs - aus and co.
Great idea! Count me in at www.adoptionroad.com
Thanks for you sweet comment on my WAGI post today. I'm fascinated by your story because my "foreign language" in college was ASL and I've secretly wanted God to call us to adopt a deaf or hard of hearing baby. My son was in a special needs preschool group with a friend of ours whose daughter has profound hearing loss and she was fortunate enough to hook up with our Infants and Toddlers program who provide her with a hearing loss specialist all the way through graduation.
Blessings and prayers as you navigate school with your little one.
Melissa
www.thecorkums.com
I love the idea of forming a network! I was led to your site via Andrea. Our six-year-old daughter (adopted Oct 2009)is profoundly deaf and we're in the process of adopting two 3-year-olds from China, one of whom has microtia. I have a blog, but have been siltent for the past few months. It's a long story, but life is beginning to return to normal (whatever that is) and I'll be posting again soon. You can visit me at earstohear-vicki.blogspot.com
Have you seen www.deafvillage.com? It contains lots of blogs about hearing loss-- some parents, some adults, some teachers, some adoptive families, etc.
Sorry to comment on such an old post but I am trawling the blogs for like minded mums.
I have 3 kiddos' , my youngest daughter is adopted from the Philippines and has bilateral moderate hearing loss. She wears a bone conductor hearing aid, is expressive language delayed and the cheekiest tiger ever. I look forward to following your blog.
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