LIFE with LEXIE

Unfortunately summer wasn't full of only fun times and dress up. Lexie has been having chronic ear infections since her second birthday in May (and the doctor says she could have been having them before that as well but just not having any symptoms - poor baby.) She also failed a hearing test in her right ear in Jan but since she was just finishing up with a cold they thought it might be that so told me to check her again around her birthday. Since she kept having the ear infections I couldn't get her in until early Aug and she failed a second hearing test. On a graph they wanted to see a simple "hill" that goes up to a one and then smoothly comes down. She was a flat line in her right ear and only .5 in her left ear. So off we went to an pediatric ENT. More tests and he said she was already at the beginning stages of another ear infection so I could continue to put her on antibiotics but in his opinion they were not going to stop until she had tubes put in her ears. I hated to hear that but kind of expected it since my niece Brooke had the same problem and had a couple of sets of tubes. My sister, Lynn, said it made a world of difference as well as was very quick. So five days later I found myself handing over my sweet baby to a nurse to have them put her under for the surgery. Luckily they gave her these meds to make her loopy and it certainly did. She was laying in my arms very relaxed looking up at the ceiling going "dot...dot...dot" to the ceiling tiles. It was pretty funny until that nurse came in. She told me it would be about 5 minutes. Well it was the longest five minutes of my life but the surgeon actually came out in just over 5 minutes to tell me she did just fine. He found thick yellow liquid in both ears and he's sure it should help her hearing as well as hopefully stop the ear infections. She was wheeled out on this kid sized gurney twenty minutes later and unlike the other kids that came out before her kicking and screaming and thrashing around like they told us this drug makes them do, Lexie was very still just staring up and when I called her name she looked at me with one big tear rolling down her face. It just broke my heart. I couldn't help thinking maybe she thought she was back at the baby house or that I wasn't there and that she was all alone. Once I held her and talked to her she was fine very quickly and I felt better too. She was up and going by the afternoon and I have to say it has really made a difference in her speech. She chatters away now where as before she was very cautious in her speech.

After her surgery she was back to her old self and then some. We did go to the Blackberry Festival again this year and Lexie went right to her favorite fountain. That's where she met this interesting little boy in disguise. He was so cute in his mask and he decided he had to help Lexie reach the water - Thanks! She was soaked but had a ball. She has fun playing in the sand and getting dirty too.