Hearing it

Last week we had an audiologist appointment for Madeline. Children with Down Syndrome often have some degree of hearing loss. We had her first audiologist appointment when she was a week and half old. I think of all of her appointments this was the one I was most nervous about. The thought of her not being knowing that singing her to sleep wasn't going to work, or that I couldn't just jabber to her and see her smile at my funny sounds. The audiologist spent about 3 hours running different tests on her to determine where her hearing was. He said that although it may be a little low it was close to average for a newborn. I can't explain my relief, joy, excitement. It seemed that with all the other medical stuff that was being thrown at us to know that she could hear me seemed to make everything else more doable.

Over the past few months I love to see her react to sounds. Sometime is jumping she James knocks down his block, or to watch her calm down when I sing. She loves to mimic you, she isn't a big talker but if you sit in front of her and talk to her, she will coo and babble back. It is an interesting thing that you don't really think about the small things until something makes you realize how wonderful they are. I never had a second thought about singing James to sleep when he was a newborn or watching him learn to talk. I think that Madeline will be a great teacher in appreciating the small gifts and accomplishments of life. I know that she may still need hearing aides, glasses, braces, etc. but in the end we will love her for who she is and be grateful for all the little blessing we get.