Don't get me wrong, she has been acting fine and seems to respond to our voices. I mostly didn't want to get my hopes up that there was improvement only to find out she has more hearing loss. She would still be my Jillian Rose, but I was scared. I made a quick mention on Twitter as we left for the appointment on Tuesday morning.
After a similar screening we had in January, followed by a different evaluation, it was determined that Jillian is doing well! She has no extra loss from before, (though no improvement which is fine with me in light of everything), and she is where she needs to be developmentally for her age. What a relief!!
The awesome thing about our visit? We found out that a program through the Oklahoma State Legislature passed a law that would include Jillian's unilateral hearing loss to be covered under a special program. Essentially, our tax dollars will be paying for Jillian's evaluations until she is 3 years old! What a wonderful blessing!!
It sounds like we will be going every 3 months to evaluate where she is and what help she will need. There is no set path for unilateral hearing loss because it is on a case by case basis. It sounds like she may need help once she starts school. Even then, she might need a hearing aid or she may not need anything.
To this day, I'm thankful for finding this out now. It was heartbreaking at the time to hear that my 1 month old baby has moderate to severe hearing loss in one ear. Without the support from the amazing staff at the clinic, and my incredible family and friends, I don't know how I would have gotten to this point. The point where there is no blame necessary and all we need to do is help Jillian as best as we can.
It helps to hear a professional tell you your child can do anything. In reality, I already knew that :)
And because you have been such good sports with my wordy posts lately, here is a little eye candy for you!
{Reaching for those toes!}
{What a smile :)}
{A girl and her piglet}
{Sleepy girl}
{I mostly wanted to show how HUGE this bib is on her! It's like an extra shirt HAHA}
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