Oliver had an unexpectedly eventful week last week with his ears. He has been having ear infections on and off since last September when he started daycare. At first, we knew when he got them because he ran a fever that got him sent home from daycare and sometimes was concurrent with other viruses or infections. His ears were completely clear at his 15-month checkup in December but were "thick," as the pediatrician described them, at his 18-month appointment. No fever, no tugging at his ears, no crying at night -- but two nasty ears -- and, as time went on, somewhat delayed language development. He did a of antibiotics, then went back to the doctor. One ear was clear and the other was not. We decided to wait a few weeks to see if the other would clear on its own (as we were reticent to give him antibiotics with no fever or pain present). We finally went back on Tuesday, with Wes in tow, and both ears were again "thick." The pediatrician did a tympanometry test, which showed that his ear drums were not moving very much, and we all agreed it was time to see an ENT.
The pediatrician recommended using the ENT practice at Vanderbilt, but said they were often hard to get an appointment with. Her nurse called the next morning and told us that the ENT clinic -- the nurse practitioner there, in fact -- could see us on June 14. She had mentioned, though, that Wes was a faculty member at Vanderbilt, and the clinic was trying to see if they could fit us in sooner. The nurse called back an hour later -- Oliver had an appointment that afternoon at 2:00pm for hearing tests, with a 2:40 appointment with the pediatric ENT himself. I had class, but fortunately Wes was able to take Oliver to his appointment. He said the hearing tests were kind of sad. They had Oliver sit in Wes's lap and played a series of tones to in different directions. When Oliver looked at the tone, he was rewarded with a picture of something he liked (Wes chose a dog as his reward picture, and Ollie spent the entire time saying "dog," "dog"). Wes said it became quickly obvious that he could hear much better than Ollie could. So the ENT, not surprisingly, suggested having tubes put in. What was surprising, though, was the timing. They would add us to the schedule any morning, so Wes took Friday to give us at least a one day lapse to get things in order.
Wes had two classes on Friday, so I was alone with Oliver. I was up at 5am and got Ollie up around 5:30am or so to head to the hospital. He wasn't allowed to eat or drink after midnight, and this was my greatest worry. Anyone who knows my kid knows he likes to eat, and I couldn't imagine him going several hours awake without food. I changed his diaper and clothes when we got up and then bustled him to the car, got to the Children's Hospital in less than 5 minutes, and parked by 5:55am. We signed in at 6am and finally were registered (confirmed that all of the information provided two days prior was correct) an hour later. People slowly trickled into the waiting room, and it quickly became full. There didn't seem to be a relationship between when you signed in and when you registered. I don't really know how that works. I assumed we went later because he had such a simple procedure and didn't have much that needed to happen pre-operatively. But who knows. I was irritated with the parents who were sitting in the waiting room with coffee and fruit under signs that said "no food or drink" (since none of the kids there could have anything to eat or drink). I just hoped that Oliver didn't notice and ask for anything, and in the end he was a real trooper. He and I played in the waiting room and read books, and he didn't really fuss at all. We went back to holding around 8:15am and waited there until probably 9:15am. He got into his hospital outfit for the procedure and got his band on (and played with it periodically). There was a glider back there, so when he seemed to get kind of crazy I would rock with him, and he'd rest his head on my shoulder and calm down, almost drift off to sleep. At least five different people asked if he was on medications or had any known allergies (also included on the sheet I filled out the night before). Two nurses carried him off at 9:10am, and I talked with the doctor post-procedure ten or fifteen minutes later. He said they cleared a lot of very thick fluid from both ears, and he has to use drops this week to get the rest cleared out. I was back with Oliver ten minutes later, a little groggy and very thirsty. They let us leave right away, and he was home having breakfast at 10am.
Unfortunately, he didn't take a nap that day. I put him down around 11:30am, thinking he would nap soundly, but 90 minutes later he was still upstairs talking to himself. So I let him get up and play. I was trying to finish a paper due at 5pm, and right around 4 he got really fussy and cranky and wanted to be held. Fortunately, Wes came home around then so that I could proofread my paper and get it submitted. I rocked with Ollie on the porch swing while Wes mowed (thank goodness, before all this rain came). He fell asleep immediately, and I moved us to the couch, where he slept soundly on my chest. We woke him up for dinner, then put him quickly to bed where he slept until almost 9am the next morning.
We don't go back to the ENT until mid-June for a repeat hearing test, but we can already tell he's hearing better. We've stood across the room and whispered his name, and he turned and looked at us. When the rain started yesterday morning, he stood gaping at it at the
back door. He's certainly seen rain before (though this is a new level of rain), but it occurred to us that he's possibly never heard the sound of it coming down very clearly. It's hard to know exactly what the before and after was like for him, but it's nice to know that our boy is finally enjoying the world in full surround sound.
