Welcome to Holland

I found this essay on a blog at Deaf Village and thought I would post it here to get more exposure. I thought it summed things up beautifully. We are often asked about Miles' hearing aids on the playground and when we inform people of Miles' permanent hearing impairment, there are often comments like, "Wow, that must be hard." Well, yes, and no. It's like- going to Holland. Enjoy.

Welcome to Holland
by Emily Perl Kingsley

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It’s like this...
When you’re going to have a baby, it’s like planning a fabulous vacation trip—to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It’s all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, “Welcome to Holland.”
”Holland?!?” you say. “What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I’m supposed to be in Italy. All my life I’ve dreamed of going to Italy.”
But there’s been a change in the flight plan. They’ve landed in Holland and there you must stay. The important thing is that they haven’t taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It’s just a different place.
So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.
Its just a different place. It’s slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you’ve been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they’re all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say “Yes, that’s where I was supposed to go. That’s what I had planned.”
And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away ... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.
But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn’t get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

©1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley. All rights reserved.

Deaf Village

We are now listed as contributors to Deaf Village (www.deafvillage.com) which also has many other blogs from individuals and parents of individuals who are deaf, with cochlear implants and hard of hearing like Miles. It's an interesting survey of the deaf and hard of hearing community. Check it out!

Miles' 15 month check up

Well, there have been a few interesting developments since Miles' last check up. He is now 32.75 inches tall, and 23.5 lbs. That puts him in the 90th percentile for height (pretty steady) but he's dropped to the 36th percentile in weight. He's been a little sick as of late so that may account for it. Also, we're thinking he's allergic to peanuts. Right before Thanksgiving, I gave him just the slightest bit of my toast that had some peanut butter on it. First he got all snotty and then started getting blotchy all over his body. About 15 minutes later he threw up. The doc said to just keep him away from it, maybe go see the allergist to do a whole panel. Everyone agrees that he's doing very well even though he's not walking yet. It's just a matter of time. Give him a push toy and he'll walk for miles but he still needs the assurance of something to hold on to.

The nurse who gave him his shots said the doctor came out of the examining room and told her, "You're going to have a hard time with this one."

"Why?" she asked. "Is he a real handful?"

"No," he replied, "but he's so cute you're not going to be able to bring yourself to give him the shots."

Miles is starting to say many approximations of words and do many different signs.

He uses "da-da" consistently to mean Daddy, teddy bear and ball, though he'll say da-da for lots of things.

He now calls me "ma-ma."

He says "baba" for bottle and signs for milk.

He says "ca" for car and "sheeze" for cheese. He can also approximate saying cracker.

I'm pretty impressed with his receptive language. I feel like the signing and the verbal words are coming super quick now, like he finally understands that all these objects have names and he's determined to learn them all.

Right after Miles had his vomit session from the peanut butter, I took him to Early Start for the first time in many months. He was unsure about where we were until we went to sit in circle time. Then his face lit up and he was so excited he could barely contain himself. He was so into being with all of his friends, singing songs, and playing with the parachute. When I came back after the parent rap session, he looked at me, waved and went right back to playing. He was not ready to go- the first time that every happened. If he keeps this up, he's going to be an uber-kindergartener. :)

Miles is going to be a big brother

For those who don't know, Miles is going to have a little sister to terrorize come April. We are about 19 weeks pregnant with a healthy little girl (so say the amnio results). We're thrilled and so are the grandparents now that they have a little girl to buy pink for. I'll post updates as they become available.

Mmmm... the smell of baby

I did something embarrassing but so lovely in its maternal nature last night.
Jeff was working late and I was alone with Miles for the second night in a row. It can be a very tiring experience and yet I love being the needed parent again. Miles has become very generous with the hugs lately and, when he needs comforting, I get a lot of love.
He had been wearing a cute little fleecy pull-over all afternoon while we were at the park and we had taken it off when we got home and were ready for some dinner. I had fed Miles and then put him to sleep. I was sitting alone in the kitchen when I noticed the fleece and picked it up to put it away. That's when I caught the very distinctive smell of Miles still entrapped in the fleece. I held it to my nose and breathed deep- a number of times.
I had just put him to bed and can't say that I was unhappy that he went off to sleep rather quickly. But having that baby smelling fleece near my face brought me so much joy, like I could breathe in his essence and keep him with me all the time.

Ruptured Eardrum

Miles has had a cold for about two and a half weeks. He suddenly got a fever last weekend so we took him to the doctor. There was nothing to see so we were told to go back to the doctor if he still had the fever Tuesday. He did, so back to the doc we went. My usual doctor doesn't work on Tuesdays so I saw another doctor in the practice. He didn't see anything still, made me feel like an over protective mother and said that we should come back Thursday if Miles still had the fever. He woke up Thursday with a bloody discharge coming from his ear- he had ruptured an eardrum. The infection was awful, he's on heavy duty antibiotics and now he can't wear his hearing aids until the infection has cleared.
When Jeff brought Miles in on Thursday he saw our regular doctor who told him that ears can go from totally normal to terribly infected in hours so it's not that the doctor missed something. But I'm still angry. I feel that because of his hearing aids, Miles needs to be given special consideration when it comes to colds and infections. He is now going to miss out on about two weeks of language development, not to mention possible greater hearing loss.

Miles hasn't a _thing_ to wear...

Magical Thinking

Our nanny said something to me the other day that made me irrationally angry.
While I was picking Miles up (and coincidentally, he didn't have his hearing aids in) she told me that her faith tells her that once Miles has developed his speech, he won't need the hearing aids anymore.
This really bothered me and I had to think about why. In explaining it to Jeff I was able to put my finger on it.
It has taken me this long to accept that Miles will always need his hearing aids. Always. We went through plenty of denial- maybe the tests are wrong, maybe it really isn't that bad. And when I finally got to the point of accepting his impairment, and realizing on the grand scheme of things, it really isn't that bad, I really don't need someone messing up that acceptance. As I told Jeff, it's like someone finally accepting that they have a life threatening cancer and someone else saying, "You'll be all right. I've prayed for you."
Now, I have nothing against prayer. Anyone can do as much praying for Miles as they would like. But to tell me that they have faith that his hearing impairment will just vanish pisses me off. It denies my concerns for all that he needs- the language development, constant use of his hearing aids, sign language and all other ways that a caregiver needs to make modifications for a hearing impaired child.

The year 1 check up

Miles went to the doctor on Wednesday.
Here's an example of how scattered I am- I show up Wednesday afternoon after leaving school about 20 minutes before the end of the day and about an hour before I really should (my students were in art class), to get to the doctor's office by 3 pm. The receptionist looked at her schedule and said, "Sorry, mom, it looks like the appointment is actually tomorrow." Yikes!
But they were able to fit me in anyway.
Miles is 31 inches long (80th percentile), 22 lbs. 8oz. (50th percentile) with a head circumference of 18.5 inches (75th percentile). He's so long, he's not really fitting into the 18-24 month old onesies we recently got for him- at least not with the cloth diapers.
Yikes!
He got three shots, which he handled like a really trooper, and we'll have to start the Hep B series next month. He's got the go ahead to start eating just about everything as long as he can chew it and it's not a choking hazard. Maybe we can bump up his weight percentile. :)

Miles is 1!

Last Friday was Miles' first birthday. I was looking at pictures of him from when he was first born and he looks so different now. He is a real little boy now, playing hide and seek, laughing like crazy on the swings, climbing on everything. We weren't able to really celebrate on his birthday as Jeff and I had to work but we had a family day on Saturday which was great. We opened presents, went to the park, had some cake and spent all day together. It was fun and just what I was needing.

Here are some pics from the day:

Working Sucks

I'm back to work now and every day I think, "What have I done? Why am I not at home taking care of my baby?"
The mornings are rushed, the evenings are rushed, there is precious little time to spend together as a family and worst of all, I don't think I'm doing a good job, either as a mother or as a teacher. I don't have sufficient time to plan and I don't have sufficient time to spend with Miles. I worry that he's not getting the speech development he needs or that the nanny isn't putting in his hearing aids enough. He cries when I drop him off in the morning which pulls on my very delicate mommy heart strings. I know he stops crying once I'm out of sight and that he likes Beatrice (our nanny) but I can't help but think that I should be the one staying with him, making sure he gets everything he needs. But this is good for him, right? The socialization, being cared for by someone other than mommy or daddy?

Sigh...

What I have learned about traveling with a baby

• Bring a change of clothes for the baby (of course) but also for you, your husband, the person in the seat next to you, possibly even the people in the rows in front and behind you.

Miles is a trooper. He smiled at everyone we encountered on the Super Shuttle, everyone in line at the airport, made friends with the TSA guy and charmed the flight attendants. But Jeff and I made a big mistake. We gave him too much to drink too early. When he drifted off to sleep soon after the flight took off, all was well. Then the flight staff came on over the loud speaker, woke him up and caused him to be just a bit off. Which then caused him to throw up every last drop of the formula he had drunk, most of it landing in my lap and down my cleavage. While I was able to change into Jeff's sweatshirt that only had a little puke on it, I could do nothing with my jeans so smelled wonderfully of baby vomit for the rest of the trip.

• Check out the cleanliness of the floors of your hotel if you have a crawler. On second thought, you might want to avoid that as the results might terrify you.

So we stayed in a hotel in the general vicinity of where my mother lives on Long Island. We got there late the first night so there was little time for inspection. The following night Miles spit up some of his formula and, when we wiped it up with one of the towels, saw that rubbing the carpet had turned the towel BLACK- no exaggeration. We got a room change the following morning but the second room was not much better.

• Enjoy the extended family.

I haven't seen many of my cousins since before Jeff and I were married and some even longer than that. My mother organized a big family reunion at my brother's house in Connecticut. It was a zoo and Miles was a bit overwhelmed but it was great to see all the family. It was very fun to watch Miles and James together. Griffin is still in the meatloaf phase but it was great to see him too.

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• Beware of feeding too many bananas to your baby.

While we were staying at the hotel, we took advantage of their free breakfast. It wasn't too bad though the options got a little boring after six days. We didn't bother to bring oatmeal for Miles and instead fed him food from the buffet including many bananas. At home, he might eat a bite or two of banana if we are eating some but the intake is limited. On the road, he would eat almost an entire banana by himself.

A few days after we had been at the hotel, my mother and I went shopping. The trip was cut a bit short when we received a call from Jeff stating, somewhat calmly, I must say, that Miles had worms. As you might imagine, we rushed back to my mom's apartment, took a look at the offending diaper to find small squiggly black things that looked like black fibers. At first my mother said, "Oh, maybe those are just some fibers from the hotel's carpet." But the diaper was totally infested with them. Miles would have to have eaten the entire floor to have that much in his diaper.

And off to the clinic we went. The doctor immediately diagnosed it as pinworms asking, "They're small white worms, right?" No, they're black. "Hmmm, well let's take a sample and send it to the lab." The results came back negative. Two days after leaving the hotel, all symptoms disappeared. So I started doing a bit of searching on the internet. On one forum, there were a few moms who talked about small black worm-like things in the babies' diapers. Turns out, the thing they all had in common was banana consumption. Ah ha!

• Babies are ambassadors to the world.

New Yorkers are not exactly known for their friendliness. But if you want to meet some native New Yorkers, go to the city with a very cute baby. Even in my young, hot days, I never received the kind of reception Miles did as we walked around Central Park and rode the train and subway. It helps that he smiles at everyone in order to get a reaction. He's persistent, too. He charmed men in the subway car, two women as we ate lunch, a grandmotherly sort as we sat at the lake (he was even asleep), a small girl and her grandmother at the swings, many people on the trains in and out of Penn station and many others along the way.

• Collecting is fun.

It seems that we have begun a carousel collection. We have been to a number of different places with Miles and many of these places have carousels. Whenever there is one, we go on it. So far we have been on carousels in Disneyland, the San Francisco zoo, Golden Gate Park and now Central Park. It's a ride that Miles likes and it is always interesting to see the differences in the animals that make up the carousel menagerie. As Miles gets older we can start collecting more exotic carousels or maybe one in every state!

• It's never too early to arrange a marriage.

After New York City, we drove up to Ithaca to see my friend Mihal get married. It was a huge gathering and there were many babies in attendance. Mihal's cousin and husband came all the way from Israel and brought their 14 month old baby, Elah, with them. She was so cute and sweet and Miles showed great interest. We arranged for them to meet in the future as we know she comes from a good family.

Miles goes public

Check out the testimonials at http://www.gearforears.com/ to see Miles in an endorsement for Ear Gear, the great hearing aid clips that have been a wonderful tool to help reduce parental stress. No more concern about losing or destroying the hearing aids!

A new tooth, a new car and a visit from the grandparents

Miles finally has a tooth! After being the only one in his playgroup to not have any teeth, he finally sprouted a pearly white and very sharp tooth. He has been very good about not biting me while nursing which allows him to keep nursing. As soon as I can get a good picture of it I'll post it.

We also have a new car! We got a Mazda 5, the mini mini-wagon. It seats six, has three rows, the back two rows lie flat for great cargo ability, it gets decent gas mileage for a car of its kind and has sliding doors. Here's a photo of Miles on his maiden voyage, going to playgroup.

Grandma Lorraine and Grandpa Jack came for a visit last week. Miles had lots of fun visiting with his grandparents. We went out to Moss Beach to see the tidepools but the tide was too high to see much in the water. But the harbor seals were out sunning themselves and giving birth to their pups. We weren't able to get too close from down below (it's against the law) but we found a trail that allowed us a nice view from up above. The baby seals played in the surf as the mommas rested on the shore. It was pretty neat to watch. The weather was typical of the ocean shore- overcast and cold.

On the weekend, we headed into San Francisco to show off Golden Gate Park. There is a really great children's playground with a carousel right next to it. Miles had lots of fun watching the older kids, playing on the climbing equipment and creeping around on the spongy material they put down for safety. Then we went on the carousel. Miles got to ride on a rooster this time.

After lunch, we headed towards the botanical gardens where we met up with some very bold squirrels. We finished the day at the Japanese Tea Garden where Jeff took Miles to the top of the barrel bridge and did some fancy stroller dancing. Listen for Miles' squeal of pleasure as you watch the video. A good time was had by all.

As Jeff was taking his parents to the airport, they stopped by the climbing gym to say goodbye. Miles tried his hand at climbing- I think he shows some natural talent.

"I play piano like daddy!"

I have to use one of Jeff's video editing programs to get this facing the right way but until that happens, turn your computer on its side to enjoy this very cute clip...

The Kiddie Pool

The weather for the last two days has been uncharacteristically sweltering. The Bay area is known for its very mild, temperate weather with cool ocean breezes moderating the summer sun. But this week, the sun has been winning out. It has reached a deadly 98 degrees and we have been doing everything we can to keep the house cool.

Miles has been particularly cranky for a number of reasons. First, he let me know, if we had told him it was going to be like this, he would have stayed in the womb where the weather was similar but at least he could always be naked. Second, he is transitioning from two regular naps to one. We have been trying to keep him up a little longer in the mornings to try to reduce the cranky time between his nap and bedtime but we have met with little success.

To try to entertain him and keep him cool, we have been playing in water. The first really hot day, I brought him out the backyard and tried to put him in a small foot tub filled with water. However, as he had to wrap his legs around himself like a yogi, we took him out and let him play in the sprinkler instead. I never knew trying to grab water could be so darned entertaining.

Yesterday I went to Target and got him his first ever kiddie pool. It's pretty neat. It's a cross between those spring loaded magic windshield shades and a blow-up kiddie pool. It's very portable and has a sunshield to protect my little white baby (I thought my olive-skinned genes would win out, but, alas, my baby has his daddy's pink skin.)

Instead of just filling it with water, we put the sprinkler inside and let it gently fill the pool. I'm sure Miles could have spent the whole day just holding on to that hose. Even when the water was off and he was out of the pool, the hose provided hours of entertainment.

Nine Month Well Baby Visit

This news is a little old but I thought the family might want to know...
At nine months, Miles was weighing in at 20 pounds 13 ounces and measuring 29.25 inches. That's around the 50th percentile in weight and around the 75th percentile in height. He is bouncing between 75th and 90th percentile in height so we may have quite the tall guy on our hands.
My pediatrician just adores Miles and talks about how cute he is every time he comes in. All is well and I've got a generally healthy baby (though he is currently experiencing some random vomiting- we'll have to see what that's all about).

Nes Gadol Haya Sham

That means "a great miracle happened there."
And the great miracle- Miles has started sleeping through the night.
When he was really sick he slept through the night but that doesn't really count. And Monday when we spent the day at Leeann's, he slept in the car on the way home then was up for about an hour and a half before sleeping through until morning.
But last night was the first time he went to sleep at 7:15 pm and didn't really wake up until 5:30 am. Jeff asked if waking up that early was still considered sleeping through the night, and, yes, it is. And best of all, I was able to sleep through the night as well instead of waking up to check whether or not he was still breathing. It took awhile, but we finally got there!
In so many of the baby books, there are statements like, "If you (insert action here), your baby will never (insert desired response here)." There are many statements of absolutes. But babies are such unique creatures that I don't believe there is any one statement or rule that can apply to all babies. Families have to do what works for them and the baby.

Falling in Love with My Baby and Other New Tricks

An acquaintance told me that having a child was like being in love every day. While there are some days where I am more in love than others, I would have to agree. That's how I can still smile at him and kiss him even when he wakes up at 5:00 in the morning.

When he first began to smile for real, I totally fell in love. When he began to laugh, it got even better. Many months ago, we were walking home from the library in his stroller that faces me and he began to giggle every time he looked up at me, as if he had just noticed I was there, as if he hadn't seen me for weeks on end. And when I asked, "What are you laughing at?" it just made him laugh all the harder. That was great.

But now he's in a phase where he is doing something new all the time and it is often so cute my heart just explodes. For example, on Monday, in a moment of weakness, I let him watch his first ever Baby Einstein video. It was Baby Neptune, all about water, including water at home. There was a video clip of a little baby taking a bath and the baby waves at the camera. My little guy, who loves watching other children, raises his little hand and waves back. It was so adorable I had to grab him and kiss him.

That afternoon we went to visit Leeann and her two little ones, Zoe and Sam. We had our first kiddie pool experience (not too different from the bath) and stayed for dinner. Sam wanted to show Miles all of his toys with wheels but didn't allow anytime for actually playing with them. He would just bring one and then run off to find another. After a few minutes there was one small baby surrounded by a sea of wheeled toys. He was so overwhelmed, he didn't know what to play with.

Whenever I see Miles' hearing teacher, Kerry, or talk to my mother, they ask about any new developments like crawling or getting teeth so I've started to be very aware of his new
accomplishments. His latest trick is pulling up on my fingers and standing quite stably while holding on to something. So
he now has a little play set designed for crawlers and cruisers. Check out how proud he is of himself. Note that he also is still all gums.

Griffin Henry Blanco

Miles has a new cousin. Griffin arrived on 5/30/08 sometime in the afternoon, measuring 21 inches and weighing 8 pounds, 5 ounces.

Miles is looking forward to meeting the whole clan this summer!

And here is a picture of big brother James.

Nine Months

It has been nine months since Miles made his way into the world. That means he has been out of the womb as long as he was in the womb.

My mother came to visit last weekend and there was a moment when I caught her looking at me playing with Miles. When asked what was up, she said, "I'm just looking at you with him and thinking where did my life go?"

Where did my life go, indeed. It has been a fast trip so far and they tell me it just keeps on gaining speed.

I'm in the midst of the daycare search debacle. Finding good childcare is hard enough but finding good childcare for Miles is even harder. On top of everything a parent looks for, I need to find him a place where he will not get lost in the midst and one in which there is a good enough ratio that they can keep an eye on him to make sure he doesn't choke on or lose a hearing aid. It's challenging enough for me to keep the darn things in his ears and I'm his loving mother.



In celebration of reaching the nine month milestone, here's a slide show of him from birth 'til now.
http://cmd.shutterfly.com/commands/pictures/slideshow?site=favphotosofmiles&page=favphotosofmiles&album=53



And here he is modeling his newest Ear Gear, designed to (hopefully) keep him from losing or destroying his hearing aids.

The $4000 Chew Toy

Miles has ruined his second hearing aid. He finds those moments when I turn my back and suddenly he has his hearing aid all the way in his mouth. He ruined the first one last week. In fact, it might have been earlier. I was going to post an entry entitled, "I am a terrible mother." Here's the story.
It was the Saturday before Mother's Day and, as you have read previously, Miles was sick. He had already had a few episodes of projectile vomiting when something would hit his especially sensitive gag reflex and he would puke up everything in his belly. This led to some very exciting breakfasts as Cheerios seem to really set him off. So I had my back to him as I was sending out a Mother's Day e-mail about the "true meaning of Mother's Day." Suddenly, he was puking again and when I rushed over to him, I found the item that was triggering his gag reflex was his hearing aid. After a mild panic and extreme self flagellation, all was fine. But I discovered his hearing aid did not work sometime the following Wednesday.
I found him sucking on the other one yesterday. I think he does it to punish me for not making him the complete and total center of my universe. Fair enough.

The First Real Cold

Miles got his first real cold. It lasted for over 10 days and he spiked the first scary fever of his little life.
We ushered in the first hours of my first official mother's day, like some cruel cosmic joke, in the ER as he woke with a fever of 105.2. Now on antibiotics, he's doing much better.
But it led me to wonder what I would do if he ever got really sick. Not just the cold and flu stuff but something like cancer. Just dealing with his little cold made me feel helpless. He cried for almost every moment of Friday, would cry when he coughed, when he woke with raging fever, when he couldn't eat because he was too stuffy. And he looked to me with those beautiful eyes and asked me to help. And all I could do was hold him, try to nurse him, try ineffectually to reduce his pain a little.
Is this the ultimate lesson of motherhood? To let go of trying to control things? To accept that we are truly helpless?
I had more insight about this a day or two ago but the exhaustion has wiped my brain clean.

Miles shows musical genius

Miles and his dad perform a duet.

Miles embarks on his solo career.

San Francisco Zoo

I took Miles to the zoo a few days ago. I have mixed feelings about zoos and the SF zoo did nothing to change that. We started off at the children's zoo which was definitely the place to start. The first exhibit had bunnies and guinea pigs running about a big yard. One long hair guinea pig looked like someones toupee had escaped from his head. Miles didn't quite understand that there were things to look at. He just stared at me with a look that said, "Tell me again why we're here?"
But when we got to the prairie dogs and the meerkats, he was interested in the scurrying creatures and then got the idea that this was a place to look at things. He was pretty captivated by the meerkats. Then we got to the petting area. There were goats and sheep just wandering around so we pet some. At first, he was kind of freaked out by the goats but when he saw that I was touching them, he reached out to feel the fur. We also had a lot of fun looking at the ducks and pigs. I'm not sure if he recognized the signs for them as we do them quite a lot at home, but I'm pretty sure he recognized my imitation of their sounds!
He had his second ride on a carousel and this time sat on top of a horse. He enjoyed the ride and watched the painted pictures moving by.
Then we moved on to the bigger animals. While some of the animals like the kangaroos and the giraffes had open spaces to move about, some animals like the tiger, the lions and all of the bears we saw, had much smaller enclosures. While most seemed not to mind too much, the polar bear was pacing back and forth in a truly pathetic way.
While I'm glad Miles had the opportunity to see the different animals, I'm not sure that I feel the need to return anytime too soon.

The Dog Phase

Miles is in his dog phase. During pregnancy he went through many different phases- one where he looked like a chicken, one where he looked like a fish, like a lizard, etc. Once he was born, there was the loaf of bread phase, the plucked chicken phase, and the reptilian brain phase. But now he is in the dog phase. What, exactly, does the dog phase entail, you ask?

Well, he is unusually friendly, ridiculously attached to his owners/parents, makes this "mmm, mmm, mmm" whine like a dog and he loves shoes. Especially chewing on them. He has a special attachment to his father's duck shoes but he also likes my slippers, my black slip-ons and, well, just about any shoes he can get his hands on, including his own. He will fold himself double to chew on his own shoes. One day, I actually had to take his shoes and hide them because he was chewing the dye right out of them.

Personally, I'm waiting for the moment when he begins to chase his own tail.

Dancing in the living room

Miles has a great smile and a funny laugh but my favorite of his expressions is one of unbridled joy. He scrunches up his nose and opens his mouth wide in a huge smile. It's impossible not to feel happy when he gives you this smile. It usually lasts for just a moment or two but it leaves a warmth that follows you through your day.

Yesterday I put on some music to entertain me during the afternoon. I brought him into the living room and we began dancing to Michael Franti's "You Can Bomb the World to Pieces (But You Can't Bomb It Into Peace)." Maybe it was the fact that I was singing to him, maybe it was the upbeat rhythm or, as I like to believe, the political, peaceful message, but the entire time we danced, he had this look of complete unrestrained joy on his face. It was such a wonderful moment, one of shared pleasure.

Disneyland

We took Miles to Disneyland a week ago. Jeff had a trip with his high school choir so we took the baby along. Despite the long trip on the bus and the overstimulation and sleeping in a new place and not being on his usual schedule, he did great!

He had oodles of adoring teenagers (and a few adults as well) to coo at him and tell him how wonderful he is. Many bought him gifts and even more took lots of photos of him just being is cutie patootie self.

One thing I learned about Disneyland that I never would have discovered if I didn't go with a baby is that they have a special baby center right off of Main Street. They provide high chairs, very nice changing tables, itty bitty toilets for the potty training set as well as comfy chairs with some privacy for nursing. It was never very busy and gave us a great place to have a little down time.

We tried out a few rides with Miles. The first ride was the Finding Nemo Submarine (it used to be 10,000 Leagues Under the Sea but no one even knows that movie anymore.) He did great on the line and enjoyed the bubbles until things went dark and there were loud noises. Then he lost it. What do you do with a screaming baby in a confined space? We just passed him back and forth between each other and hoped for the best. He calmed down once the lights were back on and we smiled apologetically to everyone around us. Oof, what a disaster! But he enjoyed the carousel much more. I think we could have done a lot more if we had the patience for the lines. I think Miles would have been just fine on the railroad and boat rides. Jeff and I managed to get on a few adult rides thanks to our eager baby watcher, Vicki. Thanks, Vicki!

Miles wrestles an alligator

Early Start

One of the benefits (if you can call it that) of having a child with hearing issues is the free help you get from various resources. In San Mateo county, they have a program called Early Start that works with families of children who have all sorts of developmental issues. I get to work with a wonderful woman named Kerry who comes to our house every week and works with Miles and me on sign language, hearing acuity and other developmental skills. While Kerry has no concerns about Miles beyond his hearing and speech, she comes anyway. It's a great time to play and she seems to think Miles is as wonderful as I do. I also get to bounce some concerns off of her as she is both a mother and someone who has dealt with many families in the same boat as myself.

On her first visit, she talked about the emotions of having a special needs child. She mentioned that the divorce rate is high with couples whose children have special needs. The emotions, she said, mirror those of dealing with death- denial, anger, acceptance, etc.- and said that my husband and I might go through all of these emotions but may do them at different times. The one that stands out for me is denial. We had a lot of that and still do. Jeff and I questioned whether or not the tests were right. We kept agreeing that he seemed to hear everything and is quite sensitive to noise. How could he have a hearing problem?

I have only seen a few times when it is obvious that he is not hearing me, usually when I am far away from him. I am reminded constantly that the hearing aids are essential for proper speech development and we would see a difference if he didn't use them. But still, there is a part of me that wonders if the tests got it right.

The other emotion that looms large is guilt. We did both genetic screening and a CT scan to check for genetic or physical anomalies that could be blamed for Miles' hearing loss. Both tests were negative meaning they will never know why it happened. And that leaves open the window for huge self-blame. Did I not take my prenatal vitamins at some crucial point? Did I exercise too much, too hard, in too hot weather? Am I to blame for this? My friend Leeann points out that many children she has dealt with in her practice were born to women who did street drugs, who didn't eat well, who were homeless and under extreme stress and they gave birth to physically normal children. Sometimes, she says, shit just happens. There's no one to blame.

I am quick to remind myself that this is not a terrible thing. Kerry often tells me that if you have to have a hearing loss, the kind Miles has is one of the best- it's mild and easily remedied. If this is the worst thing to happen to him, he will have a blessed life. But still...

From the beginning

After 6 months of trying we finally got the BFP, five days after my father died. I was elated and sneaked back into the bedroom to tell Jeff. He was bleary but happy.

And then the worry set in. For months I was on edge, wondering if the baby was going to hold. Women far younger than me had miscarried.

But my belly kept growing and it seemed that everything was going to be just fine. I was eating well and continued to exercise, rock climbing up to three weeks before giving birth.

Finally, the time came. I went into labor around dinner time on 8/28/07. I knew it was happening for real by about 10 pm and hunkered down in the living room, knowing I wasn't going to get any sleep that night. I had back labor so I knew I was in for a rough ride. The hypnobirthing training helped me get through the night without too much difficulty but by 6:30 am or so, I wanted our doula there. Jeff massaged my back as we waited for Jeanna and, once she got there, she helped me with some positions to take the pressure off my back. My water broke in a big way at about 10:30 am and we were off to the hospital. I was already 5 cm. dilated and beginning to question my decision to go without pain medication. Jeanna got me into the shower where Jeff continued to massage my back and I moaned, "I can't do this, I can't do this!" By the time I was out, I could feel the baby start to crown. The nurse just barely restrained herself from rolling her eyes at me but checked and sure enough, I was 9 cm. and the baby's head was right there. They called the doctor and by the time she got there, I was 10 cm. and doing all I could not to push. Once the OB had her scrubs on, I got into my squat position, Jeff behind me with support. I pushed a total of five minutes and Miles was out, healthy and happy.

They did the first newborn hearing screening when he was just a day old. He didn't pass but the nurses told me not to worry as there might be amniotic fluid in his ears and they would test him again before we went home. Again, he didn't pass but I was told this was not unusual.

He seemed to be able to hear. Once he was home, he would jump at loud noises, open his eyes to sound and generally respond to the world around him. But when he didn't pass the ABR at one month, we were told he would need further diagnostic testing. At two months, we did a longer ABR and it showed that he had a mild to moderate hearing loss in the mid-ranges of sound. Thus began an endless series of appointments; to the ENT, to the audiologist, to the pediatrician, back to the audiologist, for earmolds, for hearing aids, for new earmolds because the first ones didn't fit, for his real hearing aids, for earmolds (again!).

And now I will get on my soapbox. One major bit of learning for us was that few health insurance companies cover hearing aids. This enrages me. They will pay for speech therapists and occupational therapists and all the things Miles would need if we did not correct the hearing loss immediately, but they would not cover the bit of prevention necessary to make sure his development happens as it should. This is not such a worry for us (the insurance Jeff has partially covers HAs and we would be able to spring for the cost if it didn't) but what do low income families do? How do they make sure their children get the support they need? What do senior citizens on fixed incomes do when they need hearing aids? This seems criminal to me, especially when we're talking about children who have yet to develop language.

Despite the hearing loss, Miles has been developing right on schedule. In all other ways, he is right where he should be. He is rolling over, pushing up on his arms, babbling, tracking with his eyes, and sitting up stably. He is a constant joy to Jeff and me. He is aware and happy and cute as can be.