So a few months ago there were some red flags that Corey's wasn't hearing as well as he should. For awhile I thought he just wasn't listening. When I would tell all the kids to go get in the car he would still just be sitting there playing. I would get after him for not listening. There were a few of those instances. Then one day we were all sitting at the table for dinner. Peter asked Casey to say the prayer. In the middle of the prayer Corey (who had his eyes closed for the prayer) said, "Casey! dad said say the prayer!" That was while Casey was praying. It was clear he couldn't hear the prayer. Night time prayers were the same way. If the room was dark and he couldn't see someone was praying he would miss the prayer all together.
I mentioned it to his speech teacher who had seen a decline in his speech scores since March. It was now summer. I scheduled an appointment with an audiologist who confirmed he had acute hearing loss in his inner ear. Corey needed to hear things at a 50 decibel when normal is 0. For a couple years now I had expressed concern to my pediatrician regarding this very issue. That is snoring, sleep apnea, speech, hearing, large tonsils, was something that needed to be addressed. But the pediatrician always said he was fine. After the audiologist we scheduled an appointment with the ear, nose, throat doctor who confirmed that he had significant hearing loss due to fluid in the inner ear. This can be caused by large tonsils and adenoids that don't allow the ear to drain properly. We scheduled an adenoidectomy, tonsillectomy, and tubes in the ears to assist drainage and restore hearing.
He was a serious trooper! We were at the hospital by 6:30 am, with surgery scheduled at 7:30. He was a little hestitnat but was tough and went with the doctor. They were only gone about a half hour and our little guy was back. It took a bit for the drugs to wear off off but we were home by 10:30. The next week was spent recovering and taking it easy. He bounced back really well and it is so nice that he can hear well again. We notice a huge difference! He also doesn't snore anymore and can therefore get better sleep. His speech scores soared and he is doing so much better!
We played lots of eye spy games while we waited.
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