My baby is sick! :-(

The poor little guy.... Aidan's temperature was 101.5 tonight. He's been rubbing both of his ears all day, and we've been battling chronic ear infections for months now. We thought they had cleared up, but now it seems they are back with a temperature. I'm so frustrated for him.

Aidan has been going to Texas Children's Hospital to see a specialist since last year off and on for frequent infections. We have tried numerous ear drops, but almost every time we've gone back for a follow up, he still has an infection. What really stinks about those visits is they usually swaddle him and hold him down so they can look in his ear, and he will cry and scream like a banshee. Bless his heart... I swear I'm a hot mess myself not being able to do anything for him except talk to him quietly, while he stares in my eyes crying furiously unable to move. He has gotten to the point that seeing any doctor (or having his hair cut even) is a complete drama because he's still terrorized by the swaddling and poking and prodding he's been through. The last time we went in February to see his ENT, he was given the all clear finally. He has some funky colored blue and and green prescription ear molds he wears in the bathtub every night too help keep the infections at bay since his infections seem to be at least partly related to water and soap in the ear. He will bring them to me every night to put in his ears with no issues, but tonight he said "ow" when I first tried to put them in his ears. I'll have to call tomorrow and see if we can get squeezed in this week.

We've been blessed with a child with near bionic hearing... He hears EVERYTHING! I think of him as my hearing ear child because he has a way of letting me know what's going on around us. It's impossible to sneak off from him because he can hear the slightest turn of a doorknob (and oh the drama and tears if anyone leaves the house without him!!!) I can't believe my husband, who has classic selective listening skills like most men I know, *ahem*, and I, deaf as a doorknob, were blessed with a child so healthy that could hear just about anything. I especially love it when we are in the house, and he can hear a train whistle over a mile away or in the evenings when he lets me know his daddy is home, sometimes before James is even in the door.

I just don't want to risk Aidan losing any hearing from these repeated infections, and I know that now he has a fever I'm going to be calling first thing tomorrow and begging for a check up a.s.a.p. I was three years old before my hearing loss was detected. My mother had rubella when she was pregnant with me, but I am inclined to think that the high fevers I had after being sick with multiple childhood illnesses caused most of my hearing loss due to my age at detection and the fact I'd started acquiring language prior to detection. So, I'm inclined to be extra cautious and paranoid about any fevers Aidan has at this age, especially when he's rubbing and pulling on his ears.

On a side note.... the ringing lives on in my implanted ear five days after activation, although I'm learning to co-exist with it. I made an appointment for Thursday this week for a follow up with a different audiologist to see if some adjustment can be made for my sanity. My brain is completely lost, dazed and confused without a clue what to do. If nothing else, I might be able to turn the volume down on program one, but I'd really like to get a boost in the bass sounds. I'm not sure if that's something I can request since I tried to ask my regular audiologist for that last week, and she didn't really respond to it beyond saying she'd already mapped me by what I "told" her when she tested me. *blowing raspberries*