Most excellent news

Received some news yesterday which was... Well......... Life changing, again. But in a good way.
Here is the back story.

     Due to McKenna's deafness, we are considering cochlear implants. This choice isn't right for all children in all situations, but RJ and I feel it's right for our family and the way we want to raise our children. Part of that process is to determine her " candidacy". This includes 1. Does she have the right " kind" and " amount" of hearing loss ( check)? 2. Does  the family have the support ( emotional and financial) to make sure the child receives therapy to make the surgery worthwhile?( check) 3. Does the family seem motivated to attend the multitude of speech classes ? Will they work with the child at home? ( oh, double double check). 4. Lastly, the anatomy of the inner ears, which I have no control over ( you all know how much I hate that).


So McKenna underwent MRI last Friday. This was originally to discover the structure of her inner ears. Due to recent  developments we also had some concerns for possible brain abnormalities. To say this was scary would be the understatement of the decade. Now, I was no longer worried about whether my child would be able to hear to speak, but rather could she even cognitively understand speech? Would she ever be able to communicate in any way?

She underwent the anesthesia required for the MRI and RJ and I waited patiently for it to be over, the pager they give you planted firmly between us. She did well. Now we wait.

Yesterday, we received a phone call, and the result we had been hoping to hear came forward. " NORMAL". Brain is normal, ears are normal...... Normal normal normal.  The relief is overwhelming. Our baby is our baby, no matter what. This will allow her more chances in life, which is our goal. So, last candidacy point checked! Now, nothing stands between us and the implants but time! McKenna will never not be deaf, and implants don't " fix it". She will never hear as we do, as her sister hears, but she has a fantastic chance to learn to speak, learn to hear music, learn to interact with her peers. She has, as never before, the chance to partially gain back some of that lost sense. She has the chance of hearing her mommy and daddy tell her we love her.