Distant help

Yesterday a mother we are trying to help in the south of India, called up.She does not have the required support as far as her hearing impaired child is concerned.She is touch with me for the last 6 months now. She was desperate for her 3 year old and then through some contact she had contacted me. She was so depressed then and had the worst things to say about her life and the deaf child.I too was saddened by the situation and kept talking to her to try and help her  come out of her situation. Her husband decided to visit us here in Pune  He visited us 3 months back to understand the techniques we have to teach, the deaf child.He took the videos I post on the youtube under the name "rouchi6". He took lectures from Mrs. Hudlikar and went back a happy and educated man.The mother saw the videos and soon enough we were able to get her out of the situation and today she is a very happy and motivated mom.She calls me about every month 1-2 times and is has all her queries listed down with examples, explanations and all the details that can give me an idea of how her lil girl is doing. I put in all that I know from my own experiences and tell her how to go about it. She asks me to give some demos and we take videos on that topic and put it on you tube so that she knows how to solve that problem.
On the phone y'day she said that the inputs from blog and the videos we have posted , have helped her immensely.She is now knowledgeable enough to know the difference between good and bad or ineffective speech therapy.She is talking to her 3 year old after learning from us in spite of the distance and I heard her lil girl speak on the phone. She spoke so well!! I am so happy and thankful to God that yes, we were able to change a life  of a family with this little effort.It takes me quite some time to edit the videos and to put the lil movie on the net, but it is all worth it if we were able to change some life. I now feel it is possible to even now give speech therapy sessions from a distance thanks to the technology.She recommended the videos and blog to the so called audiological center where she goes for any help. They rubbished it and consider the method we learn as " old and outdated". The mother immediately said it does not matter how and what she is teaching, the bottom line is the kids are talking and going to normal schools. I feel the method we learn will be effective even 20 years from now as it is not just the bookish knowledge that she is giving us. The education, books she reads, experience of the last 40 years and what she sees around herself is all knitted into the teachings she gives us. We are not confined to a boring room, but have sessions in her garden, living room, bathroom , prayer room, bedroom or in the park, in the vegetable market, you name it and we are there. I am so blessed to have her in my life.Now this lady is coming to visit me with her girl and will see for herself how normal our lives are.I am inspired to work harder in documenting the teaching and to share it with other parents.I hope we are successful in our endevour. 

Speech therapy and broken bone

Prisha had a fall from the slide in garden on Sunday. She was on the grass just thrown like a rag doll. I screamed and rushed to oick her up. We had no clue then how bad the fall was as the fall was bad. I was scared to move her as I did not know if she hurt her back, rib or scalp as she was crying bitterly. After a while I shouted at her to calm down to know where she was hurting. I made her walk to see if her body was fine.She walked and i was relieved wit tears still rolling down my eyes. I rushed with my friends home , where we made her lie down. She held her left hand tightly against her as that hurt her a lot. I did not want to take a chance. I rushed to the hospital with my friends as I did not want to take  a chance. The X' ray showed that fortunately she just escaped with  a hairline fracture near the wrist of her left hand. I was so relieved that I started to just loosen up and laughed out { the fall was such that I was fearing something really awful}. I cheered up and then we went to the trauma center and got her hand in a cast.Now she is in it for 4 weeks. She was very nervous. But inspite of the fear, pain, nervousness and wait at the hospitals, we had our speech therapy inputs.We talked about the pain, x'rays, nurse, doctor and the cast and sling everything that we could talk about. we related the whole experience to out friends at the speech therapy class and it was good to educate all the kids as it was not something that happens everyday. The teacher had planned something different for the speech therapy class that day, but that is what is different about Mrs. Hudlikar, she makes the speech therapy class situation related and prefers to take the class on what was on the mind of the kids which here was Prisha's broken arm.

Sorry state of affairs

A grandmother from our speech therapy class got inspired and wrote about the life changing experiences of deaf children and their parents in a local newspaper of Maharastra , our state.This paper caters to even small villages and is very widely read. After this hundreds of parents with their deaf kids rushed to meet Mrs. Hudlikar asking her to perform her magic on their deaf kids who were speechless due to various reasons. The kids were in the age group of 20 to 30 years but that hope in the parents had not died , that one day their child too would talk and call out to them.It was a very overwhelming experience for her as at that age to develop speech is very difficult. All the wrong habbits in speech have been developed, voice is spoilt and the the child is too settled in his world. The stories that came out were horrifying.A leading audiologist in the city is doing the test and then giving hearing aids which were sometimes out of reach but parents still bought them as they wanted the child to be integrated. No mention of speech therapy where the child learns to perceive sound is given .The speech therapy given is so poor that none of the kids talk. Children who are intergrated into normal lives were not shown as they do not have such kids.The parents are illetrate and are not in a position to ask questions. In due course of time when the child does not talk, due to lack of good speech therapy, the child is recommended for cochlear implant without any preparations for the parents. The poor parents, in order to normalize the child's life are ready to sell their land and homes . Some get them implanted but due to lack of speech therapy, the child is where he was even a year back. When will this mal- practice stop? Is not the duty of the audiologist and the implant surgeon to give a complete service?Is the speech therapy not part of it all?The parents should know that after the expensive aids or CI , how the child would be by showing past cases. They will never show you, even if you ask as they have nothing to show. Why can't the focus be the most important factor- speech therapy? The aid and Ci are just means to bring the sound to the ear, but the speech therapy gives meaning to it and helps to interpret them. I am not against them making money, make it but give the service too. The main thing lacking is also parents support group. i wish they would come together and fight the system. But they fear them as they are the ones we need to go to for the tube, wires, moulds etc. we can't fight them as there are no alternatives.I feel for those kids and their parents. I wish I was able to make this blog reach out to the remotest of villages so that the parents could understand and make choices.The circle could break. My teacher is so depressed looking at the parents who had hopes and tears in their eyes.I wish the mothers could come together and form a group so that we could educate the parents. This was the reason to start my you tube account-    rouchi6  .this is speech therapy which has changed lives for the last 40 years, it needs to be spread.The mothers trained under her are all very good speech therapists and counselor. As we don't have certificates we are not recognized by anybody.I wish some good soul could see this and bring change in India.

Glands behind the ear

I am a bit worried as now Prisha has these glands behind her right ear which have started to pain.She has such nodules behind the ear and the scalp on the lower end since birth and I could feel them while feeding her. I asked a few doctors about it but they all said they are sweat glands and would go away. Month ago she had boils on her scalp above her right ear which pained her a lot. Thankfully they are now scabs and are slowly dying.She is now down since 10 days with very bad bout of cold and cough and 2 days back she complained of pain in the 2 glands behind the ear. Any suggestions? I wonder if anybody has had issues like this and may need attention. I hope it is not related to her hearing impairment.I am at a loss about it. I did surf the net and would consult a specialist, but any input would be really appreciated.

Kidney stones going

Today I decided to get Prisha's sonography done to know the status of her kidney stones. i did have a bit of a restless night thinking about the findings. I got ready early and woke Prisha only when it was time to go. No toilet as the bladder needed to be full, topped it with milk and then we were off to the clinic. It was decided that the "photographs of the stomach" shall be taken first by me [ for the fibroid that I have] and then she would get hers clicked.

I was thrilled to know that out of the two 3 mm stones , one had gone and the 2nd was now 2.9 mm big. So Dr. Sunil Anand, your medicines are working.After many days , there was some peace of mind. Her boils on the scalp too have reduced in size and pain.Her ear too scratch a bit but the it could be due to dry ears caused by my blow drying her ears. I use mullien ear drops at night and then there is relief all day. I am hoping for some more good news by the year end. Hopefully she would be hale and hearty the entire next year.

Ear itching still on

I am wondering if ear itching is part of hearing impaired children or it is just with Prisha. She has been scratching her ear regularly at least once a day.By night yesterday, she was scratching her ears with her fingers stuffed into her ears.My husband tells me that the itch may have always been there , but it is just that she is now able to express it in language.I have put mullien oil in her ears at night which is a homeopathic remedy for otitus media, ear itch and pain and is is to be put in ears so long as the ear drum is not perforated. Her ears are very clean. i had been to the pediatrician as she was again down with fever for 5 days, had very painful boils on the scalp and the face .i got her blood test done along with the urine test to make sure the WBC is all right.2 months back she had a huge infection [ UTI] and the WBC was too high. To play safe I got it done earlier to rule out more complications.Fortunately a few things are a little above border line and can be rectified. The fever too has finally subsided after 5 days .She is looking so pale with those constant illness in some form or the other. With the change in the new medicine the boils are bursting and I am hoping they just leave Prisha alone now.She is on vitamins last 2 months and am giving her more water to drink [ which she detests].When I wash her sores on the scalp with warm salted water , I hate her cries of pain.I am still so scared to put her left hearing aid. She has suffered a lot of loss in school too, due to her various problems.I hope she resumes school this week.

World deaf day

Today was world deaf day.Mrs Hudlikar had arranged for a meeting with a reporter of news paper to come and see for himself how it was possible for the deaf to speak through speech therapy.I am attaching the link of the news paper called DNA.

http://epaper.dnaindia.com/epaperpdf/28092009/27pune%20main%20edition-pg2-0.pdf

Some touching moments

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YN5Fdz1En0

Am sharing this from Julia's blog.It was a very soul stirring video and I wanted to share it with people reading my blog.Thanks Julia for sharing. Had a great moment with Prisha when we both watched it. Prisha asked me why the man was not talking.I told her he was using signs as he cannot hear and so he can't speak. To this she asked me why he does not wear hearing aids.Then she went on to tell me that ask his mother to put on hearing aids for him and then his mother could teach him to talk.I was so touched at her sensitivity as well as I felt that she does treat her handicap as part of life. I realized that part of her knows that it is the mother who is responsible for teaching her to talk.

She is now down with high temperature last 2 days. I am really loosing it. The moment I feel she has recovered from some problem and can go back to school , she comes down with something else.Why can't life be just a little normal?It works on me . Every morning I have got used to asking her about the ear pain, cough, cold, sore throat, itching in the ear or pain in the boils on her face. the big boil in her scalp burst last week and huge amount of discharge and then bleeding gave me a sleepless night.I wonder what is causing so much eruptions on her face. This year has been tough for us.Hope that her problems soon are out of her system.

Yippee

I went to the audiologist today to get new moulds made for her hearing aids.Since her ear is healing slowly, I don't want to use the old mould, maybe even after sterilizing it so many times the ear is still sensitive to the mould or there is still a tiny bit of remains of germs on the mould. Don't want to take any chances.I asked him to look in, keeping my fingers crossed all the while.My heart was beating fast thinking about what news he would give me. He looked up and told me there was just tiny bit of wax and canal was a little red still! I was so happy as I have waited for this news for so long.I have decided to wait for a month more, though he says I can use it now . I don't want to take chances.The ear scratching has reduced thanks to my homeopathic medicines. I am so glad that my homeopath dear Dr. Sunil Anand had assured me that the infection would go provided I trusted him and he told me not to take allopathic medicines as they interfered with his treatment. he told me if he felt the need he would tell me when to go for allopathy. I hope the day arrives soon when she would wear both aids. Her ear scratching has reduced and now when she does complain , we remove the aids and dry with hair dryer. It really helps.Next week I will see and decide if I want to change the mould if her ear is alright.I shall get new impressions done. Prisha is really brave I feel.The thought of something being stuffed in my ear canal for 1 min is so yukky.But I know she did it so well when she was 3 years old and now at 5, she is stronger.Looking forward to some happier , healthier and better hearing times. Cheers to this thought.

Ear itching

Just put ear drops last week after the visit to ENT to remove the wax from the ears. I used mullien oil for the little pain she has for the left ear. Her ear had no pain in the morning . I was happy. I used the mullien oil in the morning. By evening she said her ear was scratching I visited the ENT again today and he has asked me to keep using the ear drops waxol for 3-4 days more and avoid using the aid in the left ear for another 10 days. I am careful and have decided to not use the aid for a month more. I want to make sure the left ear is totally normal.i am just worried about her ears scratching last 3 days. i hope the ears are alright soon. I hope this ear scratching is nothing to be worried about.The right ear is itching too. God help!! I just hope all ear problems find a solution soon.