When Cory was 5 he got spinal meningitis.
The doctors told us one of the side effects was hearing loss. Well Cory
did loose his hearing. I will not lie to you, it was hard to take at first, but
it was o.k. We would make it through this, and we did.
Eight weeks later Cory came down with
Chicken pox. Well it was not your normal case of chicken pox. Cory started
to have trouble breathing. We took him to Phoenix Children's Hospital
,where they had later that evening told us Cory had Varacella pneumonia.
What that is, is where you break out with the chicken pox internally. Cory
had gotten so much worse in the first twelve hours (or less) that we were
there, the next morning that had to intubate him with a breathing machine
which he ended up being on for the next month an a half. He also had to be
put in a medically induced comma and paralyzed. They doctors gave him a 5%
chance to live.
It did not look good at all for that month
and half. Even though Cory could not hear us physically we knew he could
mentally. I also want you to know we never did stop talking out loud to
Cory while he had no hearing at all. Well on day Cory got better and got
to come home. We had a long road ahead of us. He had to learn to walk
again etc...Well he did .Now we could start thinking of him getting ready
for the CI .
Cory had missed most of kindergarten when
he was five but when he was better we sent him to a school that had a
hearing impaired program. His HI teacher taught this little boy who had to
deal with so much at the early age of 5 all of kindergarten and all of 1st
grade.
Well Cory got implanted on may of '99 and
is doing wonderful. he is mainstreamed at his old school and is getting
a's and b's. He has an FM system that he takes with him from class to
class. And also has a hearing resource teacher that visits him once in a
while. Cory can now listen to his cd player and dance and play and feel
good about himself.
-Shilo cobeardemoney@qwest.net
