I know what you're all thinking..."Thanks for that observation, Captain Obvious."
I've been really struggling lately to find balance.
Faith's therapy has been intensive and I feel guilty if I'm not devoting time to her when she is awake, working to help her overcome her difficulties with communication...then I feel guilty because Phillie is awake and here too and needs my attention just as much as Faith does...then Jeff gets home and needs attention...my voice students come over at sporadic points throughout the day diverting my attention from where I want it to be, then I need to get things ready for the Young Women (did I mention I was called to be the YW President last month at the end of the month?), and have my outside commitments like community choir...In short, I feel like Bilbo Baggins at the beginning of the Lord of the Rings, like too little butter scraped over too much bread...
Yesterday, we finally got some news that we'd been waiting for...Faith failed her hearing screening.
We're not sure how much she IS hearing, as the OAE only tests whether or not the sensations sent up the nerve in the ear come back out...Faith failed on both ears. The next step is either to continue with the Infant Toddler Program's path and have one more screening done at the local elementary school (can't remember what they called it, but it isn't 100% accurate as it asks a very small, very wiggly toddler to sit on my lap facing forward while sounds play behind her, to her side, etc. and they watch to see if she responds to the sounds that are playing around her...) and THEN if she fails that being referred to an audiologist (likely at Primary Children's in SLC) to see how much hearing loss we're talking about OR I can just talk to her pediatrician at her well child exam on Tuesday next week to see if she will use the failed OAE screening as proof enough that she can just refer us directly on to an audiologist for testing... We will see what the pediatrician says on Tuesday, but our speech therapist said that given Faith's symptoms (not speaking, preferring to babble mostly vowel sounds, not responding to her name, spinning at random times (if its hearing loss, she is likely doing this to stimulate her otic nerve), not responding to sound stimuli around her (i.e. people snapping or clapping next to her head to get her to turn around), and her newfound penchant for using her soft palate to babble instead of her lips (again, likely to stimulate the otic nerve because that is probably how she can hear the sounds that she makes the best)), she would wager that the failed OAE is correct and we're dealing with hearing loss and that she wouldn't blame me in the least for wanting to skip the second test with the audiologist at the elementary school and move right to the more drastic testing to measure how much she DOES hear in order to get her the help she needs...speech therapist is wagering that since oto-toxic antibiotics are involved, we may be looking at hearing aids, but said there are any number of reasons why the hearing loss has happened.
Well...with this news, and the knowledge that I am likely going to be spending some more time in SLC and travelling there, I knew something had to give. I'd been debating for a little while, as I've been struggling with balancing everything since we started therapies, quitting the community choir. I'd held off because it was the ONE thing I was doing for myself...but at the end of the day, SOMETHING has to give...and unfortunately, as much as I love it, its the easiest thing to cut out at this point...I've debated dropping voice students, but I want to wait to see what happens with the pediatrician, audiologist, and Faith's diagnoses before I do something that drastic, but that may end up happening too...
My family will ALWAYS come first before anything I do for myself. I've decided that if I want "me" time, I will just ask Jeff if I can go get a massage or something when I'm feeling tense, and I will take time when the girls are napping to practice my music more and maybe even start composing and arranging music again (haven't composed/arranged music in a while and that could be a fun way to relieve stress.) Faith, Phillie, Jeff and time with them are more valuable than 2 hours at choir during the week.
I will say that, even though it killed me to write the director, I felt 100,000 times lighter after it was done. I knew I made the right decision.
Right now, I need to focus on being a wife, mom, therapist, chauffer, housekeeper, and historian...
The director was lovely about accepting my resignation from the choir and told me I was welcome back whenever I felt like things had slowed down a bit.
I am content. I know that some of you may be thinking that this isn't really a "healthy" way to look at things...that I should have dropped something else before dropping my "me" time, but sometimes the easiest thing to do, is the right thing to do...in dropping choir, I've freed up 2 hours of time...time to be able to be there to put my babies to bed at night and enjoy their snuggles, time to cuddle up with my husband and talk about my stresses and what I've done during the day and listen to his stresses, and time to SLEEP!
In the end, I am a wife and a mother. I chose this path. Its not a sacrifice to quit the choir... it would be more of a sacrifice to look back and regret that I wasn't able to be fully present because I was preoccupied elsewhere and I MISSED something vital and important. That is something I could never forgive myself for...
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| photo credit ME! Yep! I took and edited this, I'm pretty proud of myself. I'm doing a bomb diggity job as family historian, right? |
Hugs and Loves until next time, darlings.
(Oh...you want more cuteness? Here you go...and you're welcome.)
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