Cochlear Implant Miracle Moment of the Day

Coming from the bathroom this morning:

(Sounds of things creaking, falling into the sink)

"AWWW........SHOOT! AWWW, MAN"

As I walk in and see what's going, he says "Mommy, this toothpaste just won't stay on the shelf....SHOOT"

Loving that he's picked up all this incidental language and is using it appropriately

thankful.

We're approaching Christian's 2nd Hearing Birthday, and not a day goes by where I am not in awe of the miracle of his Cochlear Implant. Listening to him laugh with his friends at playdates, singing with his sister, and hearing that "YEAH MOM?" as I call him from upstairs and he HEARS me from all the way down in the playroom.

He hears me.

HE HEARS ME.

I don't think this will EVER get old. I will always be thankful for my hardworking little boy. Everyday he WORKS to listen and to speak. Everyday there are CHALLENGES he faces, yet he laughs and sings and plays like any other 3 year old boy. Every he AMAZES me with all he knows. Today it was how I caught him correcting himself saying the /th/ sound in a new friend's name (Theo). Everyday he makes me BELIEVE in giving every child the opportunity to listen and speak.

I am thankful. Forever thankful.

Cochlear Implant Miracle Moment of the Day

While listening to the 90s on 9 , MC Hammer's U Cant' Touch This came on. From the back of the van I hear Christian pipe up and question "You can't touch this? You can't touch what?".  After one refrain, he's got the chorus and I hear him sing along...

LOVE IT! Someone get the kid some harem pants and a sequin vest.

Sprinkles of Miracles

Hearing him teach his sister the alphabet.

Listening to him sing with his friends.

Watching him play and make up stories for all his superheroes.

I don't think there is ever going to be a day where I am not completely in awe of the miracles that have touched our family. I thank God everyday for the miracle of the Cochlear Implant. I thank Him for giving our surgical team the gifts to give my boy sound and for giving his teachers the patience and passion to teach Christian everyday. I thank Him for giving me the grace and confidence to advocate and teach my son. I thank Him for blessing me with a strong, yet gentle and loving husband who supports our family and our efforts to give Christian every opportunity to listen and speak. I thank Him for giving Christian a sweet and social disposition that will only help him in his journey growing up as a deaf kid with a CI.

Thank you God for all the sprinkles of miracles I see everyday. I know You're ALWAYS listening to Christian's sweet voice and to my heart.

Love this child...

Christian is really into imaginative play these days, and in addition to pretending he's Spiderman, a fireman, and a Monster Truck, he also likes to play "store". Usually, he pretends he's at Target, and he buys cleaning products (welcome to my life). Today, however, he was at a different store:

Christian: Mommy! I'm going to go to Hopkins to buy you a CI. You want pink?
Mommy: Speechless, tears welling, and laughing!
Christian: Ok, Mom. You get pink!

First of all, I am STILL verklempt. Second of all, he knows me too well. Of course I would want the new hot pink Nucleus 5 processor!

Can you JUST BE QUIET?!

Those are 5 words that I never thought I would say to my profoundly deaf son. But, after a 7.5 hour long car ride down to North Carolina from our home I was just about fried.

In our family, language is always fostered and often rewarded. I know I'm the crazy Mom who has tracked his sentence progression (noting proper use of pronouns, prepositions, negations...the works...), but it's really helped me tackle certain language limitations. Christian is way past the cutesy little babbling. Now it's full on conversations. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love being able to sit down and just ask him "What was your favorite part of today?", and he'll start up a 5 minute long narration about how he particularly enjoyed going to camp at Miss Emily's, but didn't like when Lily decided to chew on his arm. I love watching his imagination at work, especially when he just decides to start making up songs about pirates, firetrucks, and donuts. However, after about 3 hours in the car with NONSTOP question asking, conversations, and songs, I needed some peace and quiet. When I asked him to be quiet and to give Mommy and Daddy a break so we could just listen to the radio, he proceeded to tell me "Mommy, you just need to calm down".

Just another Cochlear Implant Miracle...

"Mommy, Why Do You Cry?"

This week I learned of the tragic death of a college friend of mine. My friends and I are in complete shock, and we are heartbroken for his family. I've had a couple of days to process his passing, and today I found myself wiping away tears as I tried to draw a balloon with sidewalk chalk on our front porch for Christian.

My little boy, who is getting to the point where he really understands feelings, came up next to me, put his toddler hand on my head, and said:

"Mommy, Why Do you Cry?"

"You unhappy, Mommy?"

"Mommy, It's Ok"

I smiled, gave Christian a kiss, said a silent prayer of thanks, and finished drawing my balloon for Christian. Even in a moment of grief, we still were able to experience yet another Cochlear Implant miracle: my little boy using his words to comfort me.

Mother's Day Blessings

I woke up this morning to the smell of pancakes and bacon. I looked at the clock, and it was late for me (7am!). I turned over, flipped on the video monitor to check on the kids. Flipping between both channels, their cribs were empty, so they must've been with their Dad.

I walked in the kitchen, and heard the sweetest words ever:

"Happy Mother's Day Mommy"

What a great Mother's Day gift.

Hearing those words come out of Christian's mouth, with his great big smile and beautiful brown eyes just about made me melt. Just another little moment during a special day that makes me realize what a miracle his Cochlear Implant is.

On this Mother's Day, I am thankful for my beautiful children, my strong husband, and my own Mother. I'm thankful for the joy they all bring to me. I am especially thankful for my girlfriends who are also Mommies. Their perspective, whether they are also SAHMs or working Mommas, keep me grounded. Their friendship means the world to me, and our time spent together is so important to me. Without the standing playdates, park-dates, and happy hours we have together, I know that being a Mom wouldn't be nearly as much fun.

On this Mother's Day, I am also thankful for the community of Moms that I have met through this blog and the various Cochlear Implant sites. Knowing that I am not alone in this "different" journey gives me peace. These amazing Mommas give me strength, and their stories give me hope.

On this Mother's Day, I am so blessed.

A Moment of Clarity

Driving home from school today, Christian and I were having our usual little conversations. I usually ask him what he did in school, who he played with (working on answering "wh" questions, can't you tell!), if he had fun, and then I talk about all the things we see on our drive home. Not only is it a good language opportunity, I try my hardest to keep him up on our trip home so he actually will take a good nap when we get home.

Today, before I even had to ask, as we were pulling away from school, Christian just started telling me ALL about his day:

Christian- "Mommy, basketball in gym (prounounced bah-ket-ball in gym)!Mommy! Play bahketball in gym!"

Me- "Oh, Wow Christian, did you play in the gym today?"

Christian-"Shoot blue bah-ket-ball! OH BOY!"

Me-(Now with tears welling in my eyes, as I'm pulling out onto Massachusetts Ave.) "Christian, that is awesome! Did you have fun playing basketball in the gym?"

Christian-"Awesome basketball!"


At this point, it was full on niagra falls for me. I know I've been a ball of emotions lately, but complete and profound joy overcame me on the ride home today. To think that I thought I would never hear his voice. And my loving little boy is in the backseat of my car, telling me all about his awesome day playing basketball in the gym at school. Using his sweet, beautiful words.

Take a Look at Our Numbers...

Today is our 5 month anniversary since Christian's CI activation. It's hard to believe that it has only been 5 months since my little guy had his ears turned on and his world changed forever. So much has happened, and words can't even describe how incredibly blessed that Chuck and I feel to witness the miracle of the Cochlear Implant everyday. His vocabulary is ever-expanding, and he picks up new words EVERYDAY. I try to keep up with his consistent vocab usage list, but it's getting challenging since he has SO MANY WORDS.

I get the chills (and I still well up with tears) when I think back to that day in October of 2007 when our audiologist told me that Christian was deaf. I had a million thoughts and images flash through my head, and they all were silent. I never thought in a million years that my deaf son would wake up in the morning and say "Hi Mommy", or say "Thank You" after getting juice from his Daddy, or even protest and say "No!", when I ask him to stop climbing on our furniture. I never thought I would hear his sweet little voice. I never thought I would see him dance.

Yet, here we are. My deaf son is one of the most chatty little ones in the neighborhood. He loves to listen to music. He loves to dance. HE LOVES TO TALK. He's thriving in school. WE ARE SO BLESSED!

Today is also the day that we enter in the double digits of our countdown to meeting our Baby Girl. According to the ticker on the right side of the page, we have 99 more days to go until her due date. Which really means, that I have about 88-92 more days to go since I will be scheduling another C-Section. It's hard to believe that in just under 100 days, another life will join our family. We'll have another little laugh, another little cry, and another little blessing.

Today, on this cold and rainy day, I'm thanking God for the miracles that have been bestowed upon us.