Ema is in heaven. And this kid now has more shoes than both his moms combined. Close, at least.
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Friday, December 21, 2012
Inheritance is Bliss.
Today, we received the most glorious package of clergy kid inheritance clothing (thank you Rebecca Garfein and family!!). Among other crown jewels, a bag filled with the most stylish shoes known to baby-kind.
Ema is in heaven. And this kid now has more shoes than both his moms combined. Close, at least.
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Ema is in heaven. And this kid now has more shoes than both his moms combined. Close, at least.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
Sleepover #2 and more
I have to take a moment to post about our chosen family here in New York. In the past week, Ben, Ilana and Zena have come at separate times to Amisit so that Shayna and I could either get things done or have some much needed R and R. Kelly took Ami for a whole Saturday morning and then came over to our home and cleaned the entire apartment. And, after a date last night while Zena hung with Amichai, Lauren and Kelly took Amichai for sleepover #2, to give us a night off.
This is an incredibly exhausting time, on every level. I don't know what we would do without these loving and supportive people.
A heartfelt shout out to you all.
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Sunday, December 16, 2012
Amichai's Early Intervention Update
After this week of visiting both the Clarke School (for oral early intervention) and the St Frances School (for ASL early intervention), we have decided to enroll Amichai in both programs! He is completely enrolled (and accepted for services by the state) at the Clarke School and had his first day there on Friday. He had a full evaluation of all developmental areas, and as we expected, but of course felt very relieved to hear, was found to only have delay in his hearing responses and was on level or ahead developmentally in all other areas! We will get the full report and write up next week, but those were the clinicians initial comments. Oh, and they were all in love with Amichai, of course :). Next week, we are going to Clarke on Monday for his first speech therapy services and a music class, and then again on Wednesday for speech therapy and the parent/infant support group. In about two months, we will add a third day of speech therapy each week, especially once we have him wearing his hearing aids at all times. The strategy there is for him to learn all of the pre-language skills that a baby needs by nine months (when he will have his surgery) through the development of auditory awareness. They teach him to both recognize auditory input through his hearing aids and to pay attention to it...in preparation for full auditory awareness with cochlear implants. How they will do that is yet to be seen! :) Truly amazing place.
On the St. Francis front, we are currently in the process of applying for state funding for him to receive the services of two days a week of 1 on 1 ASL sessions (1 hr long) and two more speech therapy sessions (bringing us to a whopping five days a week of state funded speech therapy! Incredible). We sat in on a 1 on 1 class with the ASL teacher there...she was so amazingly talented, it was an awesome experience. We will be in the classes with him there as well so we will be learning alongside him. Such an incredible experience--the school was filled with loving, skilled people who were so welcoming and supportive of our choice to supplement Ami's auditory education with sign language. We will find out in the next couple of weeks (held back by the holidays) when he can begin there too!
By the way, while at St. Francis, we scored ourselves an amazing ASL signing nanny (a deaf parent of a deaf student at the school)! She fell in love with Amichai and volunteered herself to be with him seven hours per week starting in January!! So that is seven more hours of exposure to ASL for Amichai each week!!
We feel so confident about our choices for early intervention in both approaches. It will be a tremendous amount of work for us (five days a week of shlep) but so worth it.
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On the St. Francis front, we are currently in the process of applying for state funding for him to receive the services of two days a week of 1 on 1 ASL sessions (1 hr long) and two more speech therapy sessions (bringing us to a whopping five days a week of state funded speech therapy! Incredible). We sat in on a 1 on 1 class with the ASL teacher there...she was so amazingly talented, it was an awesome experience. We will be in the classes with him there as well so we will be learning alongside him. Such an incredible experience--the school was filled with loving, skilled people who were so welcoming and supportive of our choice to supplement Ami's auditory education with sign language. We will find out in the next couple of weeks (held back by the holidays) when he can begin there too!
By the way, while at St. Francis, we scored ourselves an amazing ASL signing nanny (a deaf parent of a deaf student at the school)! She fell in love with Amichai and volunteered herself to be with him seven hours per week starting in January!! So that is seven more hours of exposure to ASL for Amichai each week!!
We feel so confident about our choices for early intervention in both approaches. It will be a tremendous amount of work for us (five days a week of shlep) but so worth it.
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Saturday, December 15, 2012
Sunning in December.
Our boy loves the sun. The poor guy will mostly have to wait for the joys of daily sunbathing, but on this December day in the high 50s (OY), he got the most amazing dose of vitamin D. And I rocked out a wicked photo shoot. :)
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- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Friday, December 14, 2012
Whit and Ami: BFF
Check out this 6th night of Chanukah wrestling match. What 3 1/2 month olds interact this way?! So amazing. Whit and Ami were meant to be playmates.
Love this.
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Love this.
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95th percentile in height
Is it just me or has our son just grown out of his brand new carseat? It was supposed to last him up to 9-12 months. Hmmm....
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- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Finding oneself thru yoga
What I thought I was doing through this shot was capturing some yoga moves. What I actually did was capture the exact first moment that Amichai found his feet. Ever since, he's been completely aware of them and VERY interested! :) In the next shot, they'll be in his mouth for sure!!
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Monday, December 10, 2012
If you are interested in learning more...
Hi everyone :)
Oral Language Approach
An approach to deaf education that emphasizes auditory training, articulation ability and lip-reading. Amichai will be learning this approach to language at the Clarke School for Hearing and Speech in Manhattan.
Total Language Approach
A method of communication using a combination of spoken language and signs, which includes sign language, voice, finger-spelling, lip-reading, amplification, writing, gesture and visual imagery. Amichai will likely be learning this approach (with an emphasis on American Sign Language) at the St. Francis School for the Deaf in Brooklyn. At this school, sign language is used while speaking aurally in English. We will be learning ASL at the Sign Language Center in Manhattan, starting in January!
Cochlear Implants
A cochlear implant (CI) is a surgically implanted electronic device that bypasses damaged inner ear structures and directly stimulates the auditory nerve, helping individuals who have severe to profound hearing loss to interpret sounds and speech. Amichai will have this surgery at nine months of age.
Auditory Nerve
The cranial nerve (VIII) that carries nerve impulses from the inner ear to the brain. This is the nerve that did not develop to allow Amichai to hear. Cochlear implants will bypass this damaged nerve to allow Amichai to hear sound.
Many of you have just learned about Amichai's hearing loss. We are VERY happy that you are here on his blog, both to keep up with what is going on (SO helpful to us right now) and to check out everything else going on in our boy's life over the last few months!
There are a number of new terms that we have learned over these weeks that we thought we would share with you all (with how they relate to Amichai), if you are interested in learning more!
Here they are....
Deaf
A term used to describe persons who have a hearing loss greater than 90 dB HL. Amichai cannot hear anything less than 120dB, which is about the noise level of a jet engine.
Profound Bilateral Sensorineural Deafness
Bilateral means that both ears have a hearing loss.
Profound means that the hearing loss is 90dB or greater. This means that the child may not be able to hear anything softer than 90dB.
Sensorineural means that the cochlea or auditory nerve isn't working correctly.
A term used to describe persons who have a hearing loss greater than 90 dB HL. Amichai cannot hear anything less than 120dB, which is about the noise level of a jet engine.
Profound Bilateral Sensorineural Deafness
Bilateral means that both ears have a hearing loss.
Profound means that the hearing loss is 90dB or greater. This means that the child may not be able to hear anything softer than 90dB.
Sensorineural means that the cochlea or auditory nerve isn't working correctly.
This is Amichai's technical diagnosis.
Oral Language Approach
An approach to deaf education that emphasizes auditory training, articulation ability and lip-reading. Amichai will be learning this approach to language at the Clarke School for Hearing and Speech in Manhattan.
Total Language Approach
A method of communication using a combination of spoken language and signs, which includes sign language, voice, finger-spelling, lip-reading, amplification, writing, gesture and visual imagery. Amichai will likely be learning this approach (with an emphasis on American Sign Language) at the St. Francis School for the Deaf in Brooklyn. At this school, sign language is used while speaking aurally in English. We will be learning ASL at the Sign Language Center in Manhattan, starting in January!
Cochlear Implants
A cochlear implant (CI) is a surgically implanted electronic device that bypasses damaged inner ear structures and directly stimulates the auditory nerve, helping individuals who have severe to profound hearing loss to interpret sounds and speech. Amichai will have this surgery at nine months of age.
Auditory Nerve
The cranial nerve (VIII) that carries nerve impulses from the inner ear to the brain. This is the nerve that did not develop to allow Amichai to hear. Cochlear implants will bypass this damaged nerve to allow Amichai to hear sound.
A New Path On Our Journey Together
We write this post to bear difficult news, and yet we write it with great hope and a sense of tremendous joy in our lives. Let us note, before we go any further, that we are all ok, safe and in good spirits. Amichai is growing like a weed, our delicious and sweet boy....he is so alert, smiley, well-adjusted to his life with us. He is a love, and we are blessed.
Just a couple of weeks ago, after failing his first two hearing screenings at the pediatrician, we took Amichai for extensive testing on his ears, and he has been diagnosed with profound bilateral deafness. Amichai was born deaf, the nerve cells necessary for hearing having never developed in his ears. We are greatly blessed that this issue is isolated, and that he has NO other associated developmental concerns.
These weeks have been a tremendous learning curve for us. We have learned that a diagnosis of profound congenital hearing loss has very different implications for a person's life than it did thirty years ago. Today, Amichai will have access to great therapies that will allow him to develop speech and language and technologies like the cochlear implant, which, if successful (God-willing), will give him the miraculous ability to hear. Through these various interventions and technologies, Amichai will be given the speech and language skills necessary to live a full, happy and productive life with the tools to integrate into both hearing and deaf communities.
Many people have asked us what they can do to help support us and Amichai over this coming year. At this time, we are feeling overwhelmed by the amount of tasks and appointments each week that will be involved in getting Amichai the best care possible over this year. The best thing you can do for Shayna and I would be to keep up with all that is going on in our lives on this blog, so that we can minimize any added amount of time we will spend to update our loved ones about all that is going on. This way, when we connect in person or over the phone, we can talk about this and have time to enjoy talking about other things in life!
In regards to Amichai, we have learned from our doctors that the greatest gift we can all give to him over this next year is to continue with him as we have over these first three and a half months....we will continue singing, playing, talking, reading, and exploring together just has we have done with him since the day he was born, and we ask that of his family and friends as well. Because he is developing regularly in every other way, he takes in all of these cognitive experiences and learning, including language development, despite the fact that he cannot hear our voices without augmentation.
We are in the process of starting Amichai in an intensive early intervention program to help him continue to develop pre-language skills. He was fit today with hearing aids to begin the integration of sound into his life, in preparation for cochlear implantation at nine months of age. We are also beginning to learn ourselves and to teach him ASL (American Sign Language) to supplement his language development and to give him long-term access to all communities with which he may want to be a part as a deaf person. We have a tremendously amazing team of doctors and educators guiding us in this process as well as the ultimate support team of family and friends here in New York and beyond.
It was important to us to share this information with all of you, both so that you know of the journey we are on, and because we expect and hope that you will always be a integral part of Amichai's life. We made the decision to tell about what is going on by email because of this current overwhelm with things to do to get our journey with Amichai on the right track. The prospect of having private conversations with everyone that we love right now felt like too much to add to our load. We hope you understand, and we look forward to having conversations with you about it in the future.
We are certainly going through ups and downs in all of this, and the to-do list is quite overwhelming, but overall, we feel hopeful and positive. It is hard not to when we have our gorgeous, happy and beautifully developing boy in our arms. He is just amazing.
Just a couple of weeks ago, after failing his first two hearing screenings at the pediatrician, we took Amichai for extensive testing on his ears, and he has been diagnosed with profound bilateral deafness. Amichai was born deaf, the nerve cells necessary for hearing having never developed in his ears. We are greatly blessed that this issue is isolated, and that he has NO other associated developmental concerns.
These weeks have been a tremendous learning curve for us. We have learned that a diagnosis of profound congenital hearing loss has very different implications for a person's life than it did thirty years ago. Today, Amichai will have access to great therapies that will allow him to develop speech and language and technologies like the cochlear implant, which, if successful (God-willing), will give him the miraculous ability to hear. Through these various interventions and technologies, Amichai will be given the speech and language skills necessary to live a full, happy and productive life with the tools to integrate into both hearing and deaf communities.
Many people have asked us what they can do to help support us and Amichai over this coming year. At this time, we are feeling overwhelmed by the amount of tasks and appointments each week that will be involved in getting Amichai the best care possible over this year. The best thing you can do for Shayna and I would be to keep up with all that is going on in our lives on this blog, so that we can minimize any added amount of time we will spend to update our loved ones about all that is going on. This way, when we connect in person or over the phone, we can talk about this and have time to enjoy talking about other things in life!
In regards to Amichai, we have learned from our doctors that the greatest gift we can all give to him over this next year is to continue with him as we have over these first three and a half months....we will continue singing, playing, talking, reading, and exploring together just has we have done with him since the day he was born, and we ask that of his family and friends as well. Because he is developing regularly in every other way, he takes in all of these cognitive experiences and learning, including language development, despite the fact that he cannot hear our voices without augmentation.
We are in the process of starting Amichai in an intensive early intervention program to help him continue to develop pre-language skills. He was fit today with hearing aids to begin the integration of sound into his life, in preparation for cochlear implantation at nine months of age. We are also beginning to learn ourselves and to teach him ASL (American Sign Language) to supplement his language development and to give him long-term access to all communities with which he may want to be a part as a deaf person. We have a tremendously amazing team of doctors and educators guiding us in this process as well as the ultimate support team of family and friends here in New York and beyond.
It was important to us to share this information with all of you, both so that you know of the journey we are on, and because we expect and hope that you will always be a integral part of Amichai's life. We made the decision to tell about what is going on by email because of this current overwhelm with things to do to get our journey with Amichai on the right track. The prospect of having private conversations with everyone that we love right now felt like too much to add to our load. We hope you understand, and we look forward to having conversations with you about it in the future.
We are certainly going through ups and downs in all of this, and the to-do list is quite overwhelming, but overall, we feel hopeful and positive. It is hard not to when we have our gorgeous, happy and beautifully developing boy in our arms. He is just amazing.
Saturday, December 8, 2012
1st Night of Chanukah!!
Ami's first night of Chanukah EVER!!
Keeping up the 'down the street' De Lowe tradition--marching to the presents!!
First Chanukah present ever! Slam dunk from Uncle Kel and Auntie LaLa!
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Keeping up the 'down the street' De Lowe tradition--marching to the presents!!
First Chanukah present ever! Slam dunk from Uncle Kel and Auntie LaLa!
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Thursday, December 6, 2012
Style
Ok, so we're headed to a mommy meet-up (not slick). But at least we're doing it in style (real slick).
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- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Big talker.
A sweet, very current, video to celebrate the end of the BACKTRACK era of blogging: we're all caught up!! :)
Enjoy!
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Enjoy!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
BACKTRACK: Ami's first trick-or-treat!
"Amichai" loves peanut M&M's.
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- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Monday, December 3, 2012
BACKTRACK: First Trip to CA
Our little East Coast boy loved his trip to the Left Coast! From the taxi ride, to the plane ride, to meeting his many friends and family members in CA, the trip was a huge success!
It was short but very sweet!
Laughing all the way to JFK
A peaceful first plane ride
Airplanes are so much fun!
So many people to love in CA!
Uncle Brian
Mia
Opa
Ami was VERY excited to meet his cousin Aubrie and his best friend Zoe ;)
Peyton is so good with babies!!
Cousin time with Des, Mikey and Noah
Shayna's cousin Lori was so excited to meet our little guy!
Meeting Hannah and Fred Carter
Sleeping on Adriana
Best Friends
Old friends and new friends!
Ami loves his Gma!!
Great Auntie Sandy
The highlight of our trip was to have Amichai meet his
amazing Great Grandma Marge!
Nonno and Gma have high hopes for a future Giants fan!
Auntie Sunshine :)
Nonno love!
BACKTRACK: Nana and Aunt Sue visit
Amichai got to spend time with his Nana and his Great Aunt Sue in October. We had a wonderful visit with them and we also all went to MA so that Amichai could meet some of his aunts, uncles, and cousins on Shayna's side of the family. Everyone loved him, of course...
Loving on Nana
Fun with Aunt Sue
Snuggle time with Aunt Peg
Look how big Uncle Gordie's hands are...or maybe Amichai is small?
Feeling relaxed with Uncle Bob (notice the prayer shawl onesie)
3 generations of love
BACKTRACK: Brooklyn Nets! 10/17/12
Everyone in our neighborhood has been nervous about the opening of the Barclays Center, a huge stadium (or arena, depending on who you ask) that will be home to the Brooklyn Nets basketball team. We have been as anxious as anyone, since it is only 4 short blocks from our house. We have all been afraid that it might mean the end of our idyllic neighborhood due to the crowds and the drunken sports fans, etc. After years of worrying, Barclays Center finally opened this fall and we decided...if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. We took Amichai to the 2nd home game of the Nets and have decided...
BARCLAYS IS AMAZING!!!
Fan from Day 1!
This is how Brooklyn rolls!
Best. Picture. Ever.
It is ok that he slept through most of the game...the Nets lost.
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