Faced with tough decision

Oh that's awesome!!!!! Big advantage to going to St. Louis is that they are very very experianced with telling how even a baby could react to aiding.
Oh, and if I were you, I'd contact the Missouri School for the Deaf even thou it's a 100 miles away. They may be able to find some resources for you or local Deaf or even CODA families. Any chance you could move? It is very common for families of dhh kids to move for better educational opertunties.
 
PFH:I assume you mean your Hearing loss is 85db which is Profound. Deafness is 105 db which means one hearing NOTHING-silence. My left ear was at 85 db for 15 years. I had a Phonak LL6 Hearingaid-yeah missed a lot. Being cultural deaf means one uses ASL according to JennyB NOT that one is "audiological deaf'-silence. Prefers not to speak and uses ASL.
You are correct it seems that multiple meanings are used for the term "deaf" Who is and what it means.
Post #3. This is your free choice like Flip.

Implanted Advanced Bionics-Harmony activated Aug/07
 
GREAT! He will progress fine with both implants. Think about it, when those with normal hearing are born they have no idea what the sounds are, just that they are sounds and they learn as they grow. A child with implants will also have no idea of sound but will also grow. Those with implants will hear differently most likely but still form the association as to those with (normal)? hearing. Now tell me that all children hear exactly the same thing or for that matter prove to me that all hearing adults hear the exact same thing. Yes they all interpret the sound they here to certain things as to those with implants but the same? I'm sure all will go well and he will have a great life in our hearing world.
 
It surely does take a "while" to get use to sounds produced by the Cochlear Implant-my experience. No I have no direct experience in having either of my 2 sons implanted-fortunately!
Waltersfam07 as for using ASL takes a "lots of continuous practice" to master. How many other persons can respond in his environment?
Much success in the start of the new journey with your son.

Implanted Advanced Bionics-Harmony activated Aug/07
 
Educate him on the advantages and disadvantages and risks vs. rewards when he is old enough to understand all that. Then let him decide for himself when he is old enough to make decisions; Let him make the choice if its best for him.

As for language. I say teach him American Sign Language and English both. You cannot go wrong there. Knowing both will only give him an advantage.

That's what I suggest. Nevertheless, if you do decide to implant him then that is your right, you can do that. Even though many deaf don't agree with that, and I am one of them, that is your right as you are the parent(s).
 
The thing that hearing parents need to understand is that CIs turn an audilogically deaf kid into one that is hoh.
And yes, picking up ASL is hard for hearing parents. But I do think that if hearing parents demand that their dhh kids learn speech skills, then hearing parents need to meet them halfway and learn ASL too.
It does seem like the debate is over which language should be a kid's first language. My feelings on this are. that for early intervention kids need to be exposed to both. In the old days it did take a lot of time for kids to become fluent in spoken English. Which is why there are still oral programs that went up to grade 8. Nowadays, most CI kids are functionally hoh.....and I mean that can range from just needing "classic" minimal accomondations to suceed to being OK one on one but needing a 'terp in group situtions.
Waltsfamily, have you contacted Fort Leonard Wood and seen if there is anything on base that could help your son? I know you're not military.....:(
I looked to see where Ft. Leonard Wood is.......damn, not near another state. Sometimes, if you're near a bordering state you can take advantage of that state's Deaf School's services (or there might be regional Dhh programs or whatever)
 
I'm not sure if there was confusion or not, so just to clarify, our son is technically bilaterally 'deaf'. We chose to implant him because we wanted him to have that access to speech at a young age. If he chooses not to wear the external processors once he is older we will fully support that decision, no questions asked. We ultimately wanted to wait and let him make the decision himself, but soon learned the risks of waiting. We fully understand that making the decision to implant him will only make him hoh rather hearing as a normal hearing person would, which is why we feel very strongly about asl. My husband myself and his grandparents are all involved in asl classes right now. We sign everyday and he is starting to sign now! (he just turned 1 on the 17th) We contacted the MO school of the deaf in fulton and have sadly given up on them. After five phone calls with no answer and no reply we gave up. We will be involved in the MSU (MO state university) program for deaf and hoh children, which will start up in January. We have several resources in place to help us be better parents for our son. I am still very upset and sadden by the lack of resources out there for hearing parents of deaf children and ultimately the lack of resources for the deaf community. I would like to see better things in place for future families in our situation. You all the this community have been very helpful and welcoming and I thank you all for that :) I hope you all had a wonderful thanksgiving with your families!
 
Waltersfam07 said:
I'm not sure if there was confusion or not, so just to clarify, our son is technically bilaterally 'deaf'. We chose to implant him because we wanted him to have that access to speech at a young age. If he chooses not to wear the external processors once he is older we will fully support that decision, no questions asked. We ultimately wanted to wait and let him make the decision himself, but soon learned the risks of waiting. We fully understand that making the decision to implant him will only make him hoh rather hearing as a normal hearing person would, which is why we feel very strongly about asl. My husband myself and his grandparents are all involved in asl classes right now. We sign everyday and he is starting to sign now! (he just turned 1 on the 17th) We contacted the MO school of the deaf in fulton and have sadly given up on them. After five phone calls with no answer and no reply we gave up. We will be involved in the MSU (MO state university) program for deaf and hoh children, which will start up in January. We have several resources in place to help us be better parents for our son. I am still very upset and sadden by the lack of resources out there for hearing parents of deaf children and ultimately the lack of resources for the deaf community. I would like to see better things in place for future families in our situation. You all the this community have been very helpful and welcoming and I thank you all for that :) I hope you all had a wonderful thanksgiving with your families!
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Your son is VERY lucky to have such a supportive family. You've done your research! This is one kid I don't have to worry about. Good luck and do keep us posted. I'll be looking for your updates. :)
 
You're right. Lack of resources for parents, even in this day and age, is just appalling. But don't give up...they're out there, somewhere. Is there anything particular you need that some of us might be able to find for you?
 
waltersfamily, that is AWESOME!!!!! Am happy you found some resources. Is the MSU program Sign friendly? That sucks that you didn't hear back from Fulton.....grrrrrrrr.....Although we do have some posters here who are TODs. They may have friends at the Fulton School who may know of some resources.
Another idea for resources is contact the Missouri Association of the Deaf or maybe the Missouri organization for CODAs. Some state assocaitions of the Deaf have Sign mentor programs where a Deaf or CODA adult comes in and serves as a language model for your family.
Do we have any members in Missouri or any thing?
And yeah, I understand the argument "wait for the kid to chose" But on the other hand, there are kids who are right off the bat canidates who get no use or very little benift from hearing aids. I am VERY happy that you're signing....and yes, you're learning along with your son, but at least little babies have not too sophsicated language skills, so that will buy you some time to track down some ASL resources and programs.
 
Deafdyke, thank you for the links I will be checking those out asap! I'm not real familiar with CODA but if they could offer signing mentors that would be awesome. We live so rural we have limited resources (I know i have stressed this a lot but it really bothers me that just because we do not live closer to the city we are limited on access to GOOD resources) I will be checking into the CODA for sure. MSU is sign friendly, from what I understand, I do not really care what their opinions are about signing once he has his implants WE will still use sign and voice! TOTAL COMMUNICATION, I have always felt very strongly about that. I had heard some pretty negative things out about audiologists who only want children to 'Listen' only and I have made it very clear that we will also be signing. You are right we are learning with him and lucky enough his communication level is low enough we can keep up :) we are however on our 4th ASL class and still traveling to Springfield once a week and we will continue until we can find something closer that is just a useful as the class we are already in. So, deafbajagal, I guess that is really the only resource now we are lacking in just continuing our ASL journey. Like i said traveling really adds up if their were classes closer that would help out a lot. We of course use aslpro as much as we can with two little ones and we have books on every table of the house. And at this point I'm not sure it is so much learning because we know a lot of signs, but it is using it on a regular bases and reading others. It gets easy to read the ones you a with all the time. But practicing with others that are better than you helps you stay motivated and improves your skills as well. I just hate that our class is only once a week, we need it everyday all day. Other than that I have pretty much had to do all of my researching by myself. I am very disappointed in the state program that they have in place right now called MO first steps, we have just really been super disappointed in this program.
Well I am rambling so I thank you all again so much you all have given me so much to look forward to in raising our son!
Oh on last thing that has been on my mind, I feel very strongly (again) about my son being deaf and I want him to experience the culture and be involved in other childrens lives that are deaf as well. 1. I hope that he is excepted by everyone both deaf and hearing (as everyone should be regardless of the decision to implant or not) 2. Do you all know of anything like this I could get my son involved with? We are planning on volunteering during deaf week at camp barnabas and letting him be involved when he is old enough, but do you know of any other actives events etc that we could be him involved in or at least be looking to get him involved in once he is a little older.
 
MSU is sign friendly, from what I understand, I do not really care what their opinions are about signing once he has his implants WE will still use sign and voice! TOTAL COMMUNICATION, I have always felt very strongly about that. I had heard some pretty negative things out about audiologists who only want children to 'Listen' only and I have made it very clear that we will also be signing. You are right we are learning with him and lucky enough his communication level is low enough we can keep up we are however on our 4th ASL class and still traveling to Springfield once a week and we will continue until we can find something closer that is just a useful as the class we are already in. So, deafbajagal, I guess that is really the only resource now we are lacking in just continuing our ASL journey.
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YES!!!!! Very glad that you're continuing Signing. That rocks!!! And that's good that the MSU program is Sign friendly! YEAH! Now all you need is a real life Sign mentor! .....and just as an aside, the key to sucess is parental involvement. I know two hearing families of voice off deaf women, who chose to Sign only with them growing up and the deaf women are very sucessful. (one has a master's degree from a hearing college and even went to res school for high school. The other one is still in college. She went to dhh formal program for elementary, and was mainstreamed for jr high and high school)
Oh, and I do think that Deaf Schools and dhh programs are going to become more Hoh friendly, (with the influx of CI kids, who are overall functionally hoh) so, it's awesome that you're opting for a full toolbox. Your son will prolly hear better with the CI then with hearing aids.....but it's still kind of open as to how well he will hear. And that is not an attack on CIs or being anti CI BUT, response to CIs does seem to be very indivdual. Just as with hearing aids, there are implanted people who are "almost Hearing" and then there are others who respond in their own way. The pediatric dhh population is relatively small, so it's hard to track why someone is sucessfull with hearing aids vs CI or why one kid is "almost hearing" with CI and another kid requires more intense "traditional" Deaf support. Give your kid a full toolbox of options, and see where that leads to!
 
posts from hell said:
And in regards of "He's perfect as he is"... I feel the same. My daughter is Deaf too. I'll say this much (and i am expecting the other hearing parents to come in here to chastise me) - Are you for cloning, genetic engineering of humans? If not, why try to "fix" him?

:)
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I'm a hearing parent and I personally do NOT agree with "fixing" a person using genetic engineering. :) My son is perfection deaf or hearing.
 
As for PFH's thoughts of "cloning/genetic engineering of Humans"-there is nothing on the near horizon re deafness. This from a recent meeting of Cochlear Implant patients-Sunnybrook/Toronto. Cochlear Implant is a device to assist in "perceiving sound" as one will REMAIN deaf for their entire life.

Implanted Advanced Bionics-Harmony activated Aug/07
 
As for PFH's thoughts of "cloning/genetic engineering of Humans"-there is nothing on the near horizon re deafness. This from a recent meeting of Cochlear Implant patients-Sunnybrook/Toronto. Cochlear Implant is a device to assist in "perceiving sound" as one will REMAIN deaf for their entire life.

Implanted Advanced Bionics-Harmony activated Aug/07
 
posts from hell said:
Are you for cloning, genetic engineering of humans?
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If my daughter begins to lose her sight or the function of a limb and an injection of few of her own cloned cells, genetically reengineered in a petri dish (with full FDA approval) can turn that around without negative side affects ... yes, I'd consider that.

We vaccinate all of our children. If a safe means of injecting an agent into a developing embryo would ensure that my child would not suffer from cancer or other debilitating disease, I'd consider that.
 
drphil said:
As for PFH's thoughts of "cloning/genetic engineering of Humans"-there is nothing on the near horizon re deafness. This from a recent meeting of Cochlear Implant patients-Sunnybrook/Toronto. Cochlear Implant is a device to assist in "perceiving sound" as one will REMAIN deaf for their entire life.

Implanted Advanced Bionics-Harmony activated Aug/07
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Read between the lines, noob.
 
Contingent on one's time horizon. You appear to be using thousand of years which for most of us we won't be here-except that you will enjoying extended retirement! Noobs finger to everybody! You are now a troll- self-defined--congratulations!

Implanted Advanced Bionics-Harmony activated Aug/07
 
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