c and ci #2

i just posted a long ramble, but this deserves its very own post.

tomorrow is the day the audiologist turns on c's second ci (her left ear). i am so excited about it i could pop - it will be such a blessing for her, and it makes me stop and think about how amazing the medical advances have been just over the last 20 or 30 years. when i was a child, this kind of thing was really just starting to become a potential reality, but even then, it was very primitive compared to how it is now.... and now i have my little princess, and she will have the ability to hear, out of both ears, from the time she is 2 and a half onward. imagine what a profound difference that will make in her life!

i'm forever grateful, and i think maybe this is a good place to post something i wrote a few weeks ago. it's just sort of a thinking-out-loud piece...not meant to be anything of pure significance beyond a sentimental level.



Paper or plastic? The sound startled me out of my grocery-list induced reverie, and I quickly answered the quizzical cashier. However, this simple exchange would have been impossible just two years ago – before my entry into the world of sound.

The birth of a child, always a joyous event, brought double blessings for us when C was born in 2004; she was born deaf, but that meant she and I both found out we were candidates for cochlear implants in early 2005.

What most intrigues me is how differently we have responded to our aural stimulations; while I had 28 years of either silence or hearing-aid-amplified vibrato noise behind me, she had a clean slate, to be clichéd about it. While I marveled at the most inane things, such as the sound a plastic bag makes when it is crumpled up, or at the most soul-lifting things, such as a robin singing madcap to the sky, I watched her easily, quickly take her “new ear” for granted.

Is this a good thing? How could it be otherwise? Granting a child – indeed, anyone – the opportunity to replace a lost sense can only be a blessing. However, when people tell me, “You must be so happy!” upon finding out that C has her implant, I always think – Yes, I am happy, but not for the reasons you think.

Being able to retreat from a world of sound into a world of silence is its own blessing; there are days when, as a busy working mother, it is a boon to be able to remove the processor at night and relax into a world where the only intrusions are visual or touch. On the other side of things, it also forces you to become more attuned to the world – to see things you wouldn’t see otherwise. To read people’s body language. To find the slight flicker of something in a soul’s eyes. When you are not “listening,” often, you truly hear.

That’s not to say I would ever trade this experience; the pure, simple joy of hearing my son J's voice in the morning, chattering happily to his dog as he comes downstairs, or the delightful high-pitched tinkling laugh of C as she chases her big brother around the room. The rumble of my husband M's voice in the evenings when he comes home. The delight of being able to pick up the telephone and call him and have a boring, sensible, and utterly wonderful conversation about stopping by the store for some milk. The inexplicable, soul-searing experience of listening to music. The happiness that comes from all of these things cannot, and should not, ever be replaced or underestimated.

Still, even as I watch C, watch her make her way through the many notes of each day, scaling scores with ease, finding new sounds and new words, and taking it all completely, wonderfully for granted, I find myself thinking how grateful I am that she, much like her mother, has the option of inhabiting, and appreciating, both perfect worlds.