18 months

I can't believe Ellie is a year and a half TODAY! Where does the time go?

Hasn't been the greatest day, if I'm honest. OT came this morning, to fit her with a special stroller that offers more support. It's great, it fits her, she likes it...but, it is obviously a special needs stroller. It's ugly. It screams I AM DIFFERENT.

And she is different. I am just sad at the reality check.

After that appointment, we drove into the city for her audiology follow-up. I expected huge changes since our June appointment. I was so sure that she was hearing WAY better. Nope. Exactly the same as in June. Exactly. She's just learned to compensate, and has caught up developmentally, so she can communicate better.

Ellie-bean has mild-moderate hearing loss (her range was 35-50 dB)

• Mild hearing loss (26-40 dB): Mild hearing loss may cause inattention, difficulty suppressing background noise, and increased listening efforts. Patients with this degree of loss may not hear soft speech. Children may be fatigued after listening for long periods.

• Moderate hearing loss (41-55 dB): Moderate hearing loss may affect language development, syntax and articulation, interaction with peers, and self-esteem. Patients with this degree of loss have trouble hearing some conversational speech. 

Sigh. Her ear canals are much bigger than they were in June, although they`re still very small. We have an ENT appointment next week, to look at her ears. The audiologist said that it`s unlikely that wax is the issue, and it`s very likely it`s a fluid issue. But, because her canals are so small, it might not be possible to put tubes in until she`s older. Only the ENT will be able to decide that, so I am anxious about next week.

If he decides to try, there are risks to putting tubes in, it`s surgery for one, and she will need to be anesthetized.  Another option would be to wait until she's bigger to put tubes in, and use hearing aids in the meantime.

Hearing aids. 

The possibility of hearing aids, and a specialised stroller. Lovely.