Communication

[Guest guest]

--- wrote:

It totally depends on the child, the commitment of the family, and the

quality of the school program.

--- end of quote ---

(as always) is right on - my younger son Sammy is profoundly deaf and has

been since birth. Everyone who's met him is amazed by his oral speech and

language skills. He's 6 and wears Phonak Novo Forte aids. He attends public

kindergarten here in Hanover NH and also an after-K program where he's the only

deaf kid. He's very clear and very understandable. His loss is pretty much

straight across the board a 95 db loss - so borderline profound to be sure, but

profound nonetheless (he can't hear a thing without his aids unless you scream

in his ear). We've flirted with a CI for him, but even his audiologist said

that she wouldn't recommend it right now since, with tweaks to his hearing aids

that resulted in an additional 20 db gain for him, he's doing so well with aids.

Why are Sammy's speech skills so good? Who knows? We tend to be a " chatty "

family :>) - one speech therapist said that we provide a " language rich

environment " for our children, which still makes me laugh. Nicest way I've ever

been told we all talk a lot! I truly believe it's because of who Sammy is - he

enjoys language and seems to be wired for it. Our older son, Tommy, who is 8 is

hard of hearing - he too has excellent speech.

We were sort of pushed towards oral communication in the beginning because I now

realize our former audiologist leans that way - I had no idea initially there

were so many other communication options and would have investigated them had I

known of resources in our area. Tommy, since he's hard of hearing, responded

very well orally so when little brother was diagnosed about two months after

Tom, he followed in Tommy's footsteps. This was before I knew that Listen-up or

other listserves existed and while I love the Upper Valley, it's pretty isolated

in terms of being around other families who have kids with hearing loss (so glad

to have you guys down the road, Kirsten and Jodi!). So at the beginning, we

felt we were in a vacuum.

I've found *the* two most wonderful folks to be in our boys' lives - and

Rob. They both are medical students at Dartmouth; both are deaf and are sort of

the boys' big siblings. It's been great - I feel like I have two more kids

(including that girl I've always wanted)! and Rob both grew up orally,

they both sign, and move in and out of Deaf culture and the hearing world with

equal comfort. They both learned sign as adults - so they are teaching Tommy

and Sammy. It's so wonderful having them in our lives - I can do many things

for my kids but I can't be deaf or hoh! has this great bumper sticker on

her car that Tommy thinks is so funny. It says " don't bother honking - deaf

driver " - it makes me chuckle.

Bottom line - as you've been told before which makes it *so* challenging -

there's no one right way to communicate with your kids. I feel strongly that

whatever works for your child and for your family is the right way. You've

found a wonderful place to ask questions and to learn - and the listen-up

website is the best resource around. Be sure and dig around there for answers

to questions.

Good luck to you!

Barbara