Hope is a dangerous thing

There is a quote from one of my fiance's favourite movies, The Shawshank Redemption, which has been running through my head of late.

Let me tell you something my friend. Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane

I hate hope. What I hate most about it is how it creeps up on me when I am not looking. Bastard hope sneaks in and settles itself down, getting all comfortable. Just to be swiftly replaced with utter devastation when it leaves, scarpering into the distance leaving not even a trace of it's existence.

When we fell pregnant with Harriet we knew there was a chance that Will's hearing was caused by genetics and that, therefore, she would have the same. But still I hoped. I let myself hope that she wouldn't be that unlucky, that we wouldn't be that unlucky.

When she was inside me, squirming around, I let myself believe that she squirmed in reaction to Shaun's voice, to my voice. I let hope in.

In the hospital, when she failed her newborn screening hearing test at just hours old, I heard myself say 'her brother is deaf' and I heard the audiologist say 'it could be just fluid, she had a very quick birth, it's common' and I chose to believe her over what I should have known to be true. Hope made me.

And so today, when we sat for hours as she was sedated and prodded and poked and tested, I hoped. I hoped that the doctors would turn around and say 'hurrah, she can hear!'. I know that she doesn't startle at all and I know that she already failed two hearing tests and I know that there is a chance she has a genetic condition that makes her deaf. But that bastard hope was there, the whole time, taunting me.

And then when they did turn around and say that she can't hear, that she will need hearing aids, hope was gone. When they said she has a severe loss in both ears and will struggle alongside her brother to talk and learn, hope was nowhere to be seen. It deserted me. It left me empty.

Let me tell you something my friend. Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane.


Back to reality and back on the Yeah Write wagon. Come and have a read of the other awesome bloggers that are there with me. Oh and vote for your favourite if you like!

Doctors

We have been to a lot of doctors recently. We have been sick. Really, really sick. Just your average winter cough, cold, ear infection, flu type sick but it's been rough. Probably because this foetus takes enough of my energy to make me feel like crap every day anyway, let alone when I'm fighting off germs and bugs and tending to a toddler (who reverted to sleeping like a newborn, i.e. not, for a few nights) with germs and bugs also!

Anyway, as well as that we have had hearing tests and genetic testing, both of which took up a lot of time and a lot of head space. But I won't bore you with them, what I will tell you about is how is how brave and how wonderful my William is.

At his hearing test he was a complete star. Have I mentioned to you that the hospital we go to is rubbish? Well it is. Rubbish at everything but in particular rubbish at paediatrics, which, when you think about it, is pretty key, what with Will being a kid and all. But he put up with their prodding and poking and taking his hearing aids out and putting his hearing aids in and out and generally taking forever to mess him around.

And then again at his genetic testing he was again, wonderful. Brave and patient which I think you will agree are two massive achievements for an 18 month old. The testing was at Great Ormand Street which is the leading children's hospital in the country so the care was fantastic but I still think that he excelled himself in how calm he was throughout.

But the real stories came from when we went to the GP.

At the genetic testing the doctor had used a stethoscope to listen to Will's tummy and chest. A few days later we visited the GP and there was a stethoscope on her desk. While the doctor and I were talking Will had picked up the stethoscope, lifted up his top and started to try and listen to his own tummy. My heart actually bled with how cute he looked and how clever he was for remembering and re-enacting.

And then back to the GP a few days later where she used an otoscope to look in my ears

When she was done, Will picked up the otoscope, used it to look in both my ears himself and then took out his hearing aids and put it in his own ears! Again, so very, very cute and clever. 

Both of these occasions have brought out an mixture of emotions for me. First, as I hope came through above, is pride at how smart Will is turning out to be. He has seen and been the subject of at otoscope enough timers in his short wee life but I still think it's amazing how he used it to look in my ears and then his own. And the same for the stethoscope. I love how these things don't upset him, or make him angry. I love how he takes them in his stride and wants to use them on other people as well as himself. And I especially love that we can use the stethoscope to 'listen' to the new baby in mummy's tummy.

But it's the guilt that breaks me. The guilt that he even knows what to do with either of those medical instruments. The guilt that he thinks that they are part of life. The guilt that they aren't for most other children. The guilt that my baby has to go to all these different hospitals in the first place.

But for now I will try and focus on the bravery and the cuteness and my wee boy listening to his baby brother or sister inside his Mummy's tummy. Because those things make me cry in a good way!