Kiersten’s Blog

Every year we have a cleft palate team meeting with London’s doctors and every year they tell me how great she’s doing.  Today’s visit was no exception.  They told me that she doesn’t have to go back for 2 more years.  With her team visits, she sees a number of doctors: audiologist, ENT, pediatrician, dentist, speech pathologist, social worker, geneticist (which we didn’t see today), plastic surgeon, and probably more.

At audiology

They always tell me the same thing, that she’s doing great and that she’s just adorable.  Everybody loves her little voice, her big blue eyes, and her curly hair.  Of course, she still has a tube hanging out in her right ear (for almost 4 years now) which may or may not fall out any time soon.  She also still has a bit of nasality in her speech, but it’s hard to detect without the special “listening tube.”  It was amazing how much air I could hear escaping out her nose with the tube.  But she knows what to do to stop it and she does when she remembers.  So I just have to keep reminding her.  We’ll follow up with the speech pathologist in six months.  London does well with the small amounts of therapy she has had and we always get comments on how well she speaks.  According to the doctors today, it looks like she should be okay to never have a surgery again!  Yay!  One surgery at 10 months old was definitely enough for me!  We walked out the door of the hospital with smiles on our faces and covered in stickers, so tired that both kids promptly fell asleep in the car.

Ashton wanted in on the action while visiting with the ENT doctor