ABR Test

This sweet girl has been through so much in the past month. We received a notice from the school nurse that Madison had failed her hearing test in the same ear and same sounds as she had the year before. Last year, she failed her hearing test in her left ear so we took her to our pediatrician. The nurse said they just didn't push down in far enough and said she passed. Well, here we are again. 

We made an appointment to take her to see our pediatrician. She failed the same sounds and they said even a few more than she did at Liberty. They recommended we go see an ENT. 

We made an appointment with Dr. Bauer for the following week. They took her in a booth and had her raise her hand to different sounds she heard. This lasted at least 20 minutes. Then they hooked something up to her ears and did another hand raising test. This one lasted about 15 minutes. The results were not good. She has severe hearing loss in her left ear for certain frequencies. She can't hear high frequencies (the th, f sounds etc.). Her right ear is perfect. Her left ear is perfect and then all of a sudden takes a huge dip and then starts to rise again. I was shocked. We had no idea she was having any hearing difficulties. She doesn't struggle in school. She doesn't appear to have a hard time hearing us. Dr. Bauer said she is compensating for those sounds because her hearing is so good on all other frequencies. He recommended that we come back to do an ABR (auditory brain response test) to see if we get the same results. He did not want to go forward just relying on a 6 year olds hand raise. So we scheduled the ABR.

We got in for that the following week. Trent took her to this. It was a 2 hour test. She had all the wires show below hooked up to her while she watched a movie. She is such a trooper.Then they had her go back into the sound proof room and do the hand raising thing again. Poor girl. We did not get any results that day. 

We went back to meet with Dr. Bauer the following week to get the results of the ABR. This test showed that she should have heard those sounds. But from what I could gather it is not the most accurate test. The most accurate is the hand raising. Her hand raising test that she did came back exactly the same as the first time around. To me, that showed she couldn't hear. He wasn't convinced. He made a comment that she could be tricking us. I know my kid and I know she wouldn't trick us. She's a rule follower. He recommended that we come back to do a hearing test AGAIN and have two people with her...one in the booth and one running the test. He wanted to triple check and make sure she was concentrating and doing her best. He said if she had the same results he wanted us to schedule an MRI. He said he wanted to make sure there were not any lumps and bumps that shouldn't be there. That if there were, they would not be good ones to find. My heart sank. Tears filled my eyes. I had Cooper in my lap and just kept my face behind him. We had all three kids with us for this appointment because of the time of it. We scheduled another hearing test for two days later. We left, anxious, nervous, sad, scared, and hopeful.

I took Madison back for her millionth hearing test on a Friday. The results were the same. I knew they would be. We immediately called to get an MRI scheduled. They can't get us in until December 14th. It's a Saturday. After the initial comment of lumps and bumps I've been able to let it sink in. I truly don't believe we will find anything. I feel like if she did have a tumor of some kind that she would be experiencing other problems before now. Remember, she failed her test last year too! I've put my trust in the Lord. I've prayed for strength no matter what the outcome. I've prayed over our sweet girl that she will be ok through this. She hasn't said much at all. She may not have a clue what is going on. We haven't talked about it much. We haven't mentioned tumors or MRI at all. They will have to put her to sleep for her MRI. It will be about an hour long. I'm nervous about that. We will have to talk to her about it but I plan to wait until the night before. I don't want her to worry. So if you see this, pray for us!