An Amazing Toddler

By: Trish Hubschman

September, 2020

Alexa was a happy child, beautiful and sweet. It wasn’t determined if she was able to hear when she was born, but by the time her first birthday came around in August, it was almost certain that she was deaf.

Alexa’s parents, Dan and Rita, took her to hearing specialists at a local hospital. Hearing aids were tried and ruled out as unhelpful. Cochlear implants (CIS) were a possibility. More testing was done to verify this. Her CI surgery was scheduled for the following January.

Dan and Rita were excited.

During the interim months, Alexa received communication training. Twice weekly, a speech therapist came to her house and taught her sign language and lip-reading skills. On alternate days, Alexa went to a school for the deaf. This little girl, barely more than a year old, was communicating by sign language with her parents, grandparents and great-grandmother.

January 2020 came around and Alexa’s bilateral Cochlear implant surgery. She was getting two cis, one on each ear. The surgery went well. Two weeks later, an audiologist fitted Alexa with the external hearing devices, called speech processors. Alexa was getting the latest in Cochlear technology, two N7 processors. Sound would go into the processor, which would clear it up, then send it directly to the brain for translation, bypassing the auditory nerve, where this is usually done. The audiologist then turned Alexa’s Cis on, first one side, then the other, starting the volume out very low, so as not to scare her. Did she hear anything? Her baby sister, Elizabeth, made a gurgling noise and Alexa’s head flung around to see what the sound was. Rita started to cry.

Each week, the audiologist raised the internal volume of Alexa’s N7s. Alexa continued to prosper, repeating sounds and words that she heard from her parents, family, television. Every day she amazed her parents. In late August, Alexa’s grandparents took their granddaughters to the Bronx Zoo. Two-year-old Alexa had a ball. She repeated the names of some of the animals.

The pandemic hasn’t slowed Alexa’s progress down. The little girl has entered the wide world of communication. Her baby sister, Elizabeth, is also going to be a recipient of the Cochlear implant.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR…

JUST PUBLISHED: the prequel to the Tracy Gayle mystery series

TIDALWAVE

by Trish Hubschman

Available in e-book and print from Amazon and Smashwords.

Details, cover image, link to a free text sample, and purchasing links: https://www.dldbooks.com/hubschman/

Synopsis

Tidalwave’s tour bus bursts into flames while the band is relaxing on the beach. The band’s leader, Danny Tide, hires private detective Tracy Gayle to do some discreet investigation into the matter. She’s joining the band on tour as security chief. The arsonist is discovered, but much deeper, more dangerous things come to light as well: an assault, an attempted murder, and then two murders. Tracy is faced with far more than she bargained for, and her stint with the band goes further than just that summer tour. She is fully determined to protect America’s favorite rock and roll heartthrob, and they become the best of friends along the way.

About the Author

Trish Hubschman and her husband, Kevin, along with their dog, Henry, recently moved to Northern Pennsylvania. They formerly lived on Long Island, New York. Trish is a graduate of Long Island University’s Southampton Campus and has a Bachelor’s degree in English-Writing. She is the author of the popular Tracy Gayle mystery series, Stiff Competition and Ratings Game. Tidalwave is the eagerly awaited prequel to the series. For more information about Trish’s three books, please visit her website, linked to above.

See her on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14473430.Trish_Hubschman