Cochlear Implant

Simon turned two years old on June 1, 2010. We had a couple of different celebrations for him - a playground time at our favorite park, a special dinner on his birthday (cheese pizza for everyone), and a family dinner with grandparents and Tara's relatives. Simon's starting to understand the concepts of presents a little more... and that what's underneath the wrapping paper is even more exciting than the paper itself.

On Monday, June 7th, Simon had his Cochlear Implant surgery at Seattle Children's hospital. We went in that morning at 8:00, and then had to wait in the lobby for a couple of hours. At 11:30, we were brought back to the surgery center. I washed Simon down with some cleaning cloths, and then he got dressed in his hospital gown.

For the next hour, he played with a toy truck and went in and out of the sliding door that was in our room. Simon had fun playing peek a boo using the curtain, and going into the hallway and waving at Tara through the window. At 12:30, the doctors were ready. I put on a protective suit and carried Simon into the OR; I helped them put the anesthetic mask on Simon - he was doing great right up until then, and then decided that he didn't like that part. Simon quickly went out... his breathing was a bit shallow, but he looked pretty peaceful. The doctor walked me out, and then Tara and I had to go wait several hours. We were called up a couple of times for updates, in which we were told that things were going well.

At around 5:00, we were sent to a recovery room to wait for Simon. He was wheeled in shortly later, still out from the anesthetic. His face was so puffy - they had given him lots of fluids during the surgery, and he was all full of liquid. He had a blue bandage wrapped around his head with a gauze pad, which had some blood on it. Because of his tubes in his ears, he had some blood drain out for the next day. Every once in a while Simon would move around a bit, and he kept grabbing the bars on his bed. Eventually, Simon came out of the anesthetic around 11:30. The nurse came in and gave him some pain medication through his IV, which put him back to sleep.

Simon slept through the night, and woke up around 5:00 the next morning. He was still puffy, but seemed happy to be awake... before too long, the nurse was able to take out his IV, and he got to walk around. We went on some treks around the hospital, and got to go down to their playroom, which was fun for him. He found some cars to push around, and had a pretty great time. Later that afternoon, we got to take him home. By then, the fluids had worked their way out of his system, and he was looking really good.

For the next two weeks we had our regimen of putting antibiotic drops in his ear and medicine on his scar. We had a blue headband for him to keep wearing, and some gauze pads to keep things covered and clean. He also had an oral antibiotic and some children's Tylenol - those were his least favorite things. Tara came up with a good system of wrapping him up in a towel when we gave him the medicines, to keep his arms down, and it also caught any medicine that he spit out. He was so good about it, as much as he didn't like it - he would put his head down on my lap so Tara could drop the medicine in his ears, and then fuss once she did it. Same with the orals - he would open his mouth, swallow and cry, and then open his mouth again. Such a good little boy...

Now he's back to 'normal' - his scar has been healing well, and he's done with all of the meds. You can feel the Cochlear Implant in his skull - there's a silver dollar sized bulge behind his ear. I'm sure when his hair grows back in, that won't even be noticeable, but of course he'll have the external pieces that he wears.

We go in next week for his external pieces, and his first activation. My understanding is that the activation will happen in stages - they'll turn it on tomorrow, with a fairly low volume. Then we go back in a couple of days, and they turn it up and make it so that we can progressively increase the sensitivity this week. He'll go in for a couple of more tune ups (they're called mappings) over the month, and then we're supposed to be good to go for the rest of the year. It's exciting - a few nerves, and a good deal of hope that it works.