October 27th, 2016
Yesterday, my oldest son had an otolaryngology appointment at one of our state’s children’s hospitals. Over the last 6 years, he has had many appointments there…so many that I have lost track. He has had 3 surgeries, post operative & pre operative appointments, hearing tests and routine check ups. No matter how many times we have come up to Children’s Hospital for these appointments, I always leave feeling blessed. Carlitos’ struggle with his hearing has been a long, and ongoing struggle, but overall he is healthy.
Here is a little bit about what Carlos has gone through…..in a nutshell. Carlos has had problems with speech and hearing from the time he was 2 years old. At that point he started preschool and worked with a speech language pathologist. At 7 years old he started seeing an ears, nose & throat doctor, who removed Carlos’ tonsils and adenoids (tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy), and placed his first set of tubes. At age 10 he was refered to a children’s Otolaryngologist at Children’s Hospital. (Our doctor has been awesome by the way!) One day when he was 11, I looked over at him and blood was coming out of his ear. Shortly after that, Carlitos was diagnosed with a cholesteatoma in his left ear. A cholesteatoma is a benign tumor that grows in the middle ear. Carlos had it removed (mastoidectomy) in November 2011. While the cholesteatoma had grown, it had destroyed the middle ear bones. So, Carlos had middle ear bone reconstruction in June of 2012, using cartilige to reconstruct (tympanoplasty). Still not producing the results hoped for, he had another reconstruction done in June of 2015 using titanium. His hearing in his left ear is poor, and he strongly relies on his right ear (which has a tube), to hear.
At his appointment yesterday, the doctor told us that the cholesteatoma is completely gone! This is really great news!!! The audiogram showed that while Carlos hearing in his left ear is still poor, he is able to hear two of the higher pitches a little more easily than he could after his last reconstruction. His doctor suggested a hearing aid, but Carlos is not ready for that quite yet. After the trip to and from Children’s Hospital yesterday (2.5 hours one way), I went back through our pictures and I found a few from past appointments and surgeries.
Before and after surgery pics from June of 2012.
Post op. appt. 2102
Pre op. appt. March 2015 and post op. appt. July 2015
I am thankful for my 5 healthy children and the wonderful doctors and staff at the Children’s Hospital.