[3_opihi]

Hi,

I just have a few questions for you all -

My 5 month old dd doesn't laugh or babble at all, although she is very smiley and attentive. She also doesn't respond to auditory stim. We recently had a hearing test and she does have mild hearing loss in her right ear. So, now we are having an eval with Early intervention Services because her ped. thinks she has "delayed social interaction". I think what they'll recommend is probably speech therapy and occupational therapy (thats what the lady I talked to on the phone said).

I have to say, I'm surprised she can actually hear as much as she does. You could drop a pan next to her head and she won't even blink.

So, has anyone else had this experience with their baby? Why would she not be laughing and stuff yet? I've never heard of a baby not speaking, but being perfectly fine in other areas.

 

[pamelamama]

 

[3_opihi]

Hiya Pam!

I'm just bumping this up to see if I can get a response from anyone. Our eval is on Monday, and I'm not really nervous or anything - just curious to see what other people's experiences have been with early intervention.

Also wondering if anyone else has had this sort of experience with their baby?

 

[PikkuMyy]

Well, if she has hearing loss then she's not getting the sensory input of other people's noises, or the noises she makes when she does anything. So she may not realize that she can make noise. Children who are hard of hearing or mute develop in the other areas normally, provided they don't have any other issues, they just don't have a reason to make noise (or ability.) Much of babbling is babies making noise after they hear adults making noise and if a baby can't hear the adult's noise...

However, I'm surprised that the diagnosis is only mild in one ear - she really should react to a loud stimulus like a pan being hit right next to her. Perhaps you'll get a different diagnosis from the EI staff?

Let us know what happens with the evaluation!

 

[bobica]

Hi! What kind of hearing evaluation was done? Let us know how the eval goes.

 

[OnTheFence]

Hi,

I have had experience with Early Intervention. I actually loved both case workers I worked with and the therapists. They came to our home and I let them know up front about certain aspects of our parenting. (breastfeeding and cosleeping) Also it was funny because they would ask my son certain things and he wouldn't know what they were -- like when he was in speech therapy they kept trying to get him to say words that were red, like ketchup. I had to explain he had never eaten ketchup so he didn't know what it was. :LOL

Anyway, our youngest had hypotonia, and at the time hearing problems as well (however not hearing loss). He was not crawling, eating properly, or walking at 13m old. He could barely sit up actually. Anyway, the therapists we worked with were wonderful. They came to the house once a week and worked with him and showed me how to do therapy too. He had physical and occupational therapy. Part of the reason he got occupational therapy, was because his delays caused him to have social delays. Once these things were worked on, he caught up to his peers.

In my experience, if you are a thoughtful loving parent, work with the therapists on doing the therapy, attentive during therapy sessions and do your daily homework with your children (even though they dont like it), the therapist appreciate it and become advocates for you and your child more so than some other parents. You would be surprised what they see and have to deal with everyday.

With speech therapy through EI, and now through the public school system, I've had some ups and downs but overall a good experience. I was thankful for our therapists because they encouraged me to get my son medical care and set us up with doctors to get that medical care. My son needed surgery, something I was terrified of. Somethings too I realized is that it takes discipline for my 2-3 year old to do the therapy. At first I was angry how they started his therapy out -- they made him sit in a chair for it and he had to obey certain instructions, but I had to trust that they knew their job and that I had to get over the notion that my 2 year old couldn't do it or didn't have the ability to sit in a chair for 45minutes. By the time of his third visit, he was happy to see the therapist and sat still for the 45minutes while they played games and did his therapy. I think our children are far more capable of things now that I previously didn't. Jack flourished in speech therapy and is now recovering and taking the summer off after surgery. (which alone has corrected a lot of problems)

Of course my child is older than your five month old, but I think you will really be surprised at how great the therapist are, and how skilled they are. Its just allowing them to do their jobs at times. I always recommend EI and wouldn't hesitate to call them again if needed.

Goodluck!

Kim

 

[3_opihi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PikkuMyy Well, if she has hearing loss then she's not getting the sensory input of other people's noises, or the noises she makes when she does anything. So she may not realize that she can make noise. Children who are hard of hearing or mute develop in the other areas normally, provided they don't have any other issues, they just don't have a reason to make noise (or ability.) Much of babbling is babies making noise after they hear adults making noise and if a baby can't hear the adult's noise... However, I'm surprised that the diagnosis is only mild in one ear - she really should react to a loud stimulus like a pan being hit right next to her. Perhaps you'll get a different diagnosis from the EI staff? Let us know what happens with the evaluation!

Yeah, this is true, but her hearing loss is mild. She can basically hear. Bobica, she has a loss of between 20-40 decibels in her right ear. The loss comes from the sensory nerve, so its not something the newborn hearing test would have picked up. She had the 2 hour sedated test. I dunno, I know the test is very precise and all, but I almost feel like asking them to do it again, because this girl absolutely, without a doubt does not give any sort of reaction to sound.

Sometimes it seems like she doesn't react to other things too. Like, the doctor was trying to get her to follow his fingers and she just stared into space. So, he was wondering if she could see. And yesterday, I had her in the pool and she really had no reaction to being in the water. But MOST of the time she is very alert and smiley, makes eye contact, and reaches to touch my face and stuff. So I don't know what is going on. The older she gets, it does seem like she is a little different from other babies- definitely from how my boys were as babes.

Thanks for all the great replies, moms!!! I'll let you know what happens tomorrow.

 

[PikkuMyy]

Have they done any vision tests?

 

[3_opihi]

No, not yet. My guess is that they will at some point. I wonder how they test a baby this young?

 

[excitedtobeamom]

My DD has a mild to moderate hearing loss in her right ear. She began wearing a hearing aid at 18 months and she is now 20 months. She failed the hearing tests in both ears at birth but her hearing improved somewhere around her 1st birthday and she now has normal hearing in her left ear. The tested her vision at 4 months and it was not fun but made me feel better when they said it was normal. They swaddle them tight and hold their eyes open with these metal things. It was awful actually. After much testing on hearing they believe her loss is from oxygen deprivation at birth. She had a rough time after birth. She is now doing great and loves her hearing aid. She can say about 12 words and she can sign over 50 words. I would really encourage you to start signing with her. As long as her vision is okay she will pick them up very fast and it helps with the frustration. www.signingtime.com makes wonderful videos.

Early Intervention in Northern Nevada was wonderful for us. They had a pediatric audiologist who was wonderful. Now we are in Southern Arizona and we see an awesome pediatric audiologist at the Arizona School for the Deaf and Blind. I would recommend only going to a pediatric audiologist. We had the worst time dealing with audiologist through ENT's. They just didn't have the experience with babies. Also they are free through the state but I swear they are the best. EI was a big help to us and they were so nice. I hope you have the same experience.

My DD was sedated for the ABR test at 4 months but they messed up the results and we have since decided against doing it again, for now. It was so frustrating at the time to have her put under and get no where. I hope your test works out because it is supposed to really help get an understanding of exactly the loss that your child has.

Let us know how it goings! We will be thinking of you!

 

[3_opihi]

Excitedtobeamom- where in Nev are you from? I grew up in Reno

Thanks for the input. So, the ABR and AUDR can be wrong? Should we redo them?

 

[bobica]

Sometimes it seems like she doesn't react to other things too. Like, the doctor was trying to get her to follow his fingers and she just stared into space. So, he was wondering if she could see. And yesterday, I had her in the pool and she really had no reaction to being in the water. But MOST of the time she is very alert and smiley, makes eye contact, and reaches to touch my face and stuff. So I don't know what is going on. The older she gets, it does seem like she is a little different from other babies- definitely from how my boys were as babes.

Annie, this part concerns me a little bit. I don't want to be an alarmist at all, but I would ask at the eval about the possibility of small seizures. The staring into space rings a bell with me & is similar to some children i've worked with in the past that have had seizures with no visible signs, just kind of zoning out. I know there are other mamas with better info here than me & I could be off on this but I wanted to put it out there.

 

[excitedtobeamom]

Annie-Hello! My DD was born in Reno and we lived there for 15 months. We moved back to AZ to be closer to family. We loved living there and I really miss it. I would move back if I could get my family to come but they are all in AZ and NM so I don't think it will happen.

I wouldn't have the ABR test redone. They just messed ours up so we couldn't use it for anything reliable. My DD also has a sensorineutral hearing loss and it was detected by the newborn hearing test in the NICU. She didn't respond to the dogs barking right next to her until she was around 9 months and she really didn't notice a lot of sound until around her 1st birthday. She did notice movement though and she loved swimming starting at 6 months She did laugh at 3 months and said MaMa and Dada at 8 months but nothing else. She also started signing at 11 months. Every child is so different. I am sure you will learn a lot from the ABR. Let me know how it goes.

 

[3_opihi]

Hi all -- just wanted to give an update,

We had our intake eval with EI yesterday, and it was great. The two social workers/ case workers were awesome, and we actually spent most of the time talking about my mom - who runs a project at the University that teaches disadvantaged teens how to build adaptive toys for children with special needs, LOL!

Anyways, they were awesome. Totally loved Violet, and were sooooo respectful of my parenting choices! Violet's full eval with a speech pathologist, and OT are going to be in Aug. Also, at that time they are going to write up her IFSP, and we'll get some concrete answers to what is going on with her. So yeah, it went good. I still am anxious to talk to someone who can tell me what is going on with her, but its good to know that we're heading in that direction.

 

[OnTheFence]

I am so happy to read your update. Sounds like you are going to be working with a good team of people!

 

[excitedtobeamom]

I am so glad that it went well for you. If you have any questions let me know!