Almost one year ago, February 24th I believe, we received a call from our adoption agency telling us that they had Taye at their transition home and that they believed that he had profound bilateral sensioneural hearing loss. If you have met him you can totally see how this could have not been realized by the orphanage where he was for a few months. However, it was devastating for us to hear this! It was a challenging time for us as we tried to come to terms with this and what it meant. I have to say that our agency was wonderful through this. Getting him more testing with the best ENT's they had access to and making it very clear that they would completely support us if we did not feel that we were able to go through with everything.
We felt God's direction very clearly that this was the child he had for our family. He would be our child and just as any other time a parent learns of a child's disablity, we would grieve but His grace was sufficient. We dug into learning about our options should the diagnosis be correct (it was), began praying every day that Taye would be able to hear someday in some way, and in April finally went to bring our precious boy home. Along the way the things we learned about how it feels to be so supported by the people around you- in prayers and actions- amazed us! As 2 oldest children Kevin and I were pretty good at working together and handling things but this has pushed us way out of our comfort zone and forced us to rely on others. A good thing no doubt. I can't say enough about knowing that others were praying for us and the way that got us through sometimes, holding to the promises that God hears and will answer!
Once we arrived home, we began a whirlwind of appointments and tests. In December it was finally confirmed that he was definitely a candidate for Cochlear Implants. We began the process of getting approval from insurance to have this done on both ears at the same time. On March 9th Taye received both implants! In about a month (Lord willing) they will be activated and he will begin the process of learning to listen and eventually to speak clearly.
Here is Taye several hours after his surgery. He was such a trooper-- so tough! He enjoyed some food only after he reminded us that we needed to pray first!
This is the next day. They took off the dressing and we were able to come home that morning.Taye waved good bye to all his new nurse friends, shook hands with his surgeon (I'm not kidding you- he stuck out his little hand and gave him a firm handshake- his idea) and we were off.
We are home and dong pretty well other than that he is still kind of off balance and still as crazy as ever. Bad combo and equals the need for full time parental supervision!
At the end of March, Taye will start going to a school that specializes in teaching kids with CI's to speak and listen. The kids we have met from there have been amazing in their ability to speak so clearly! The school is about an hour away so in order to fill my time while I am there I took a job. I will actually start tomorrow and will be working as a parent consultant with the Early Hearing Detection and Intervention program. It was kind of a situation where things just fell in to place so easily that we felt like it was the right thing to do. I think I will learn a lot and am excited about that. Right before I accepted the position it hit me very clearly (again) how much I love being a mom. It is definitely my main job so I hope this can all work out. The reality is that I would be gone anyway, so as much as I don't want anything to change... it is.
I think that pretty much sums things up. The other kids are awesome! The best kids ever is what we usually tell them.:) Kevin is such a rock and continues to be Taye's favorite. grrr. Oh and our house is for sale. If we sell it we will move closer to Taye's school since he will be going there for about 4 years. God has made his plan clear before, we are trusting he will continue to do so!
Blessings,
laura
