'Twas Three Days Before Christmas. . .

Time to take down the Hanukkah decorations . . . .and get out the glue gun to secure the bolts (candle holders) onto the paint stirrer that is the newest addition to our menorah collection.

The stockings finally got hung up on the bannister today; the tree was decorated last weekend after standing in the living room for a week with only four ornaments on it.  Tomorrow I may get around to hanging a wreath, which is the sum total of my outdoor decorations.  All those who put up light displays that can be seen from the International Space Station are just putting money into PSE&G's pockets.  And in our neighborhood, it is always those who have the ugliest combinations of lights who put them up the earliest and leave them up the longest.

I have seen enough sappy made-for-the-Hallmark-channel Christmas movies to last me for the remainder of my life and they have served to eradicate what little Christmas spirit I was able to muster.  I'm not usually overjoyed by the holidays, but this year's holiday malaise is worse than usual due to Retail America starting to put up Christmas displays before  Halloween had arrived.  Thank you, Target et al.

The kids are excited about being off from school until January 2, 2013, particularly no Chinese language school until January 6, 2013 though no let up in the homework from Wang LaoShi.  She's a wonderful teacher, but the amount of homework given on the last day before break puts her up there in the stratosphere range as far as buzzkills go.   At regular school, each of their classes each held holiday parties and made gingerbread (read: graham crackers masquerading as gingerbread) houses.  Both kids are relatively clueless as to the events in Newtown, Connecticut.

Fortunately most of the holiday shopping was done on-line, so I have not had to set foot in a shopping mall since sometime in early November.  All the stuff is waiting in bags in the family room waiting for divine inspiration or time finally running out before I get out the wrapping paper, tape and scissors.

Meanwhile back in every day life, both of Micah's BAHAs are out of commission.  One has a nasty case of feedback, the other died while Micah was at school.  Micah and I went back to Audiology at JFK Hospital in Edison, where Micah was first evaluated and fitted with the BAHAs, but if we sent the BAHA back to Cochlear via Audiology the repair cost would be over $800.  So it's been sent off to Centennial, Colorado and the cost will be around $400 per BAHA.

The experience was a lesson as to how spoiled we were while Micah was at Summit Speech School.  When one of the BAHAs needed repair several years ago, the school's pediatric audiologist sent it off and it came back within a week good as new. No muss, no fuss and very little in the way of effort on my part.  Just how I like it.  As Forrest Gump said so eloquently, "One less thing."

And instead of helping with ordering a newer model BAHA, the audiologist at JFK, who is the same one who saw Micah in 2007 to 2009, was all over the options map:  should we have Micah seen by an ENT surgeon who would implant the titanium post so Micah would not need to wear the softband, or since air conduction is always better than bone conduction so maybe since over the ear hearing aids are so small and lightweight some sort of loop could be made to fit over Micah's ear cartilage if Micah's ENT would allow for placement in the canals of an ear mold?  or we could just get the new BAHA3 and continue on as we have been doing.  Personally, I think a nice hit of Ritalin on a regular basis would help her achieve some focus and lessen the stream of consciousness-type chatter that drives me nuts.

I'm in favor of continuing on with the softband.  The BAHAis anchored with a safety tether to the band in case it falls off. -with the over-the-ear hearing aids, if one fell off, it would be near impossible to find it due to it's small size.  No surgery (for now), and if there would be any surgery, I am not going to some new specialist at the recommendation of the audiologist, I am going to Micah's current ENT surgeon, period.