To move or not to move?

OttosNonni

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I have a beautiful new grandson who has "moderate hearing loss" He's almost 6 months old. We can tell that he hears more sounds with his hearing aids but he still seems not to hear what we consider normal conversation level of sounds. I have two questions.
1. He started wearing his hearing aids right at 4 months. Lots of testing went into getting the hearing aids but NO testing was done at the fitting or since to see if the hearing aids are working for him. Is that normal? Should there have been tests done to see if they made a difference? He goes back to audiologist in October so I want to know what my daughter should be asking. We are learning ASL and sign to him as best we can for now.
2. We don't live near a deaf school. We have considered moving out of this area in the past but with no pressing reason to do so until now. Do you think we should move to an area that has a deaf school? There's one in Jackson, TN that is just a couple hours from my family, Any suggestions/advice appreciated.

Thank you!
 
I have a beautiful new grandson who has "moderate hearing loss" He's almost 6 months old. We can tell that he hears more sounds with his hearing aids but he still seems not to hear what we consider normal conversation level of sounds. I have two questions.
1. He started wearing his hearing aids right at 4 months. Lots of testing went into getting the hearing aids but NO testing was done at the fitting or since to see if the hearing aids are working for him. Is that normal? Should there have been tests done to see if they made a difference? He goes back to audiologist in October so I want to know what my daughter should be asking. We are learning ASL and sign to him as best we can for now.
2. We don't live near a deaf school. We have considered moving out of this area in the past but with no pressing reason to do so until now. Do you think we should move to an area that has a deaf school? There's one in Jackson, TN that is just a couple hours from my family, Any suggestions/advice appreciated.

Thank you!
I would highly recommend making an appointment to see specialists in Nashville at Vanderbilt University. They have some of the best resources in the United States. They can evaluate him and discuss his needs and options for him. I would also recommend the online resources at John Tracy Clinic in Los Angeles.
 
I dont know how to test a baby. However every time we got hearing aids even the first ones ever we were stuck into that soundproof, base isolated booth and tested again with hearing aids in in a variety of ways.

At some point a chart is built and a comparison is made specifically. It takes time. But not too much considering what is possible now when the hearing aids are on the person being tested.

My only contact with Jackson TN consists of the old 76 off the interstate for food and fuel and a few major industries in that region consisting of several towns around.

From what I remember of being enrolled at Deaf School in my time, you will want to document everything. That will build a specific paper history on the child long before a decision is made to enroll same into a deaf school for the first time. I think if you are close to or in a major city like Jackson or Memphis etc al. Which will become more dangerous as the years go by that part of Rural Tennessee would be attractive. HOWEVER... Its not the best area. Or the worst.

I recall my parents taking me to the Deaf School in MSD at Frederick years before I attended. The State is in possession of a polaroid that was taken of me at 3 years old. That building and associated situation in that section of the campus has been bulldozed and gone. Cheaper and more economical to build a modern replacement where the farm used to stand. That tells me that parents were taking a journey exploring the resources then not really availible to someone with my particular needs at that time. Not until Columbia was made into State Law and then that Campus was built to take deaf children and myself then. There was a need for it. (Mostly from the 60's era German measles etc) but mine was three months prematurity which is not survivable usally. And a source of deafness when I gained size and weight faster than the nerves then growing could keep up.

But it was 6 years plus before I attended my first deaf school and gained a language, education and so on. I had hearing aids at 4 from Johns Hopkins and remember that day up there on the 6th floor of the old hospital. I was very young. But there were those younger that had been in there.

Anyway thats my story. My experience with people who were either deaf with new babies or babies who were deaf would pick up anything and everything in the way of language and build a structure to work off of in their minds in the first few years of life. You would actually be years ahead of having to move close to a deaf school in which that child would need to go at some point.

One last thought. DO NOT whatever you do allow the State to trap the child in oral only, bilingual or any other BS. The deaf child needs total freedom to learn Signed English if available or ASL if available (And it should be freely) IF there is any voice ability then a pathologist will be handy to develop that in due time. Some deaf do not have voices worth using for speaking and do not at all. Although they can read and comprehend english and sign ASL most of the time today.

In the old days Oral was forced on the new deaf students and signs were banned as a form of cheating or withheld to deny knowledge to the child. My school actually practiced a doctrine of speaking and signing english at the same time implemented by Dr Denton the Super at that time. Its much better just to go along with ASL and make the best of it today.

One situation that is not thought of is living out of a suitcase. A doctor warned my parents that living out of a suitcase moving all over the place without a way to settle long term in a HOME... a proper home as understood in the traditional way. One place to grow and evolve into Adulthood.

Thats one of the reasons I became a trucker. I cannot stay too long in one place. Although I have learned to stay at what I consider my home now for 25 years plus. It will be very difficult to move because it is. Although not too hard to do so if I had to. I go through life very lightly.
 
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