Home

I started this blog post this morning. What was I thinking!!! It is now 10:00 pm and I am finally getting back to it. Jim and I were talking tonight and he asked me if I was going to finish the blog entry tonight. I told him I had to, my peeps were waiting for an update :) It is nice to have peeps!
Without further a do.....here is what I started this morning.

We arrived home at around 5:00 pm last night. They released us earlier than we thought they would. Yeahhhh...of course the last time that happened we ended up back in the ER with pneumonia so we are hoping to avoid a repeat. She seems to be doing great. Sofie had nacho chips and guacamole for dinner last night which is a major accomplishment considering all she had done.

The dental stuff was done first and it ended up being a little worse than what we had originally thought.  They sealed her teeth, smoothed down all the rough edges to prevent food from being caught in it and filled four teeth on the bottom. He then went about trying to fix her two upper front teeth. Turns out, he wasn't fixing them, he was trying to save them. It didn't work. Her one tooth had an abscess and had to be removed. The other tooth just disintegrated when he tried to remove the decay. There was nothing left to adhere a crown to so Miss Sofie Lu will be without any front teeth until she is 7 or 8. Sadly, removing teeth at this age does not mean that the permanent teeth will come in early. It actually delays there arrival. I feel so bad that she had been walking around with an abscess tooth and none of us had any idea. That is how tough this little girl is. PS...... her wonderful dentist, at the end of his talk with us, asked us if we had dental insurance. We said yes, dental insurance doesn't cover all that much. He then proceeded to tell us that we would not be getting a bill. He was only going to charge us what our insurance covered. He is an amazing man and truly loves what he does. All he does is pediatric dentistry :)

Up next was the ABR, or the Auditory Brainstem Response hearing test. They put electrodes on her forehead and behind her ears and introduce sounds through head phones on her ears. She has to be sedated as there are measuring the auditory nerve's response to the sounds. The test took 2 hours. It felt like the longest two hours of my life. It was worse than waiting for her palate and lip surgery. It is very difficult sitting there waiting for someone to come out and tell you how much your child can hear. It is even more difficult to hear someone tell you that your child has hearing loss. Sofie has mild hearing loss in her LT ear and moderate hearing loss in her RT ear. She will be fitted for hearing aids on Tuesday. Sofie is doing great, talking up a storm. She is so smart. She picks things up like that. Unless you talk loudly and to her LT side all she hears is mumbly gibberish. She has a total of 19 words that she uses on a daily basis although some of them, only Jim, Ainsley and I know what they mean. The rest of the time she just talks non stop....and she does her sign language, sings and laughs and reads books. Yep, her most favorite thing to do is read a book to us. She doesn't want anyone to read it to her, she wants to read it, upside down too! She is good!

I am doing better now. I have had a hard time since her ABR. You already kinda know what the test is going to show, but, to actually hear those words uttered is like a huge blow to your gut. You just want to cocoon them and protect them. She has been through so much already and I just want to make her life as easy for her as I can. I can't and she will do great!!! She is such a fighter. She just goes through life with that great big grin on her face. She is amazing! She has no fear.  I realized today how stressed out I had been about this test. Today was a great big release. It is a process I need to go through and I will get there. I cannot wait to see her when they turn on her hearing aids. Just think of all the things she has been missing.

I wish I could take Sofie and fly all over the world with her and introduce each and every one of you to her. Anyone who has met Sofie and has spent any amount of time with her knows what I am talking about. She is amazing. She effects people. She changes people. People just stop and look and talk to Sofie and are instantly changed, they are happy. They leave the encounter with a huge smile on their face. I see it happen over and over again. It is such a privilege to be a Mom to this little spit fire. It is also amazing to watch Sofie and Ainsley together. They love each other to the core.

One day at a time............. our new adventure begins :)