Patchwork Girl's Rambling Warps
Saturday, July 12, 2014
      ( 2:04 PM ) Jessica  
This past week, I completed my Phase 2 cochlear implant evaluations.  We stayed in Dallas (at a motel 6 near the hospital) to avoid the need to drive back and forth. We got together with my sister on Tuesday, had dinner at a Cajun place...

 The first one, on Tuesday 7/8, was with the audio verbal therapist and she gave us an idea what to expect, and wants the expectations to be on the LOW side so that we aren't disappointed.  I'm working on that, though I do have hopes that I won't lose my ability to hear music.. even if it takes time to re-learn how to listen to it and adjust the processor, etc., etc..
I already knew that I would not come out of surgery OR activation with restored hearing and I KNOW that there will be a fair bit of work to be done, and that it may take a few months before I can make sense out of the sounds coming into the processor... hopefully knowing what to expect will be helpful... and knowing to just RELAX and stop trying every so often... just sit and listen passively & foctus on non-audio stuff for a while with the external parts on...

Wednesday morning was the balance test. That was interesting. I had to wear these weird eye goggles with the left eye covered... first I had to follow squares with my eyes... then I had to count in different fashions while having cool air blown into each ear and then warm air.. counted backwards, counted by 2s... and 2s backwards... the afternoon visit was with the neuropsychologist and we talked about a lot of things related to getting a cochlear implant. At the end, I told her about my evaluation last year at UTSW and she said she was not familiar with the doctor or audiologist from there & she said that Dr Peters is very careful and thorough, and that he would not have sent me to see her unless he felt that he could help me... that is awesome.

I should have a surgery date as soon as my surgeon reviews the reports from the various evaluations...

I've been reading some/watching some and here are some links that I think would be good for everyone curious about and considering cochlear implants. If you have any recommendations, *please* send them to me! :

Sound and Fury Part 1
Sound and Fury 6 years later
The Heather World (This is a talk that Heather Artinian gives at her college. She is in Sound and Fury.)

I'm not sure if the above links have captions on various tablets & smart phones, I will check my tablet and see if they do or not and will add those links. On computers, you can turn the captions on and off.

http://www.washington.edu/news/2013/10/09/new-strategy-lets-cochlear-implant-users-hear-music/ Music!
http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/13.11/bolero.html article about hearing Ravel's Bolero with a Ci
http://cochlearimplantonline.com/site/ Cochlear Implant Online
http://www.c-a-network.com/index.php Cochlear Implant Awareness network

Facebook Groups:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ciexperiences/ Cochlear Implant Experiences
https://www.facebook.com/groups/10581738294/ Cochlear Awareness Networks
https://www.facebook.com/groups/153601038015605/ Cochlear Implant Users
https://www.facebook.com/groups/349059495171094/ Advanced Bionics
https://www.facebook.com/Cochlear?ref=br_rs Cochlear Americas
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MedEldiscussion/ Med El


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Welcome to Patchwork Girl's Rambling Warps blog... where I talk about just about anything from projects to just stuff to rants and whatever... I started blogging here on July 31st, 2002 and have been blogging on my website with Movable Type. I do not promise to blog regularly! I will blog when I feel like:

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