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July 12, 2011

secTion B

TaTe Talk

Think about all of the noise that floods our ears every day. For most, a mo-ment of silence is rare. There is rarely a moment without, at the very least, the hum of the air conditioner or noise coming from the world out-side. But what if all of that background noise that we hear went away. What if you heard nothing?

Slayden Sowell is just like any other child. He loves playing with his toys, preferably his toy animals, and enjoys watching the Disney channel on televi-sion. But though Slayden is only two and a half years old, he already has a remark-able story. Slayden was born deaf.

For the first year of his life, Slayden, the son of Scott and Alexis Sowell, was in and out of doctors’ offices, 32 different appointments to be exact, having test after test run to determine if there was anything they could do for him in order for him to be able to hear. Slayden’s mother, Alexis, a teacher at Strayhorn Elementary, al-ways tears up when discuss-ing the struggles that her son has been through in his young life.

At first, the news that Slayden couldn’t hear left her devastated.

“You have all of these dreams for your beautiful new baby and then all of those dreams suddenly are shattered with the news that your child is deaf,” Alexis said. “All I could think was that my baby’s life is ruined. I didn’t even know anyone who was deaf. At the time, it seemed like a disease.”

“The doctor said if he would be able to hear any-thing, it would have to be something like a jet engine. He would have to be stand-ing next to it and it would only be at a whispered tone. I’ll never forget that. It was really sad,” Alexis said.

In Mississippi and Ten-nessee, it is a law that a newborn’s hearing must be tested before leaving the hospital. If it weren’t for the law, Sowell says, there’s no telling how long it would have been before Slayden’s parents realized that he couldn’t hear a sound.

“Every night when I put him down, especially in the first few months of his life, I felt guilty putting him in his bed with the lights out because I knew he couldn’t hear. I would cry after I put him in his crib. I was think-ing that when he wakes up, he would be scared because not only could he not hear, but it’s pitch black in his room, and if I left the lamp on he’d wake up,” Alexis said. “I felt guilty for tak-ing another sense away from him even for a couple of hours each night. He did smile, coo, and he loved to make sounds with his lips. I guess because he could feel that on his lips. He was the happiest baby in the world, and still is.”

The doctors told the Sowells about cochlear im-plant surgery and it seemed like the only option, but it was a yearlong process, with Slayden having to go through hearing aids, hear-ing tests, speech therapy, having to get new ear molds every four weeks so that his hearing aids would stay in his ears, and dealing with insurance companies that don’t pay for hearing aids.

Doctors fitted Slayden for hearing aids when he was two months old, and he wore them for nearly a year, while having hearing tests month-ly. He never responded to a sound.

On November 23, 2009,

after a year without hearing despite the hearing aids and treatment, Slayden had his cochlear implant surgery.

Following a cochlear im-plant surgery, a patient must wait one month before hav-ing their implants activated. The surgeon told the Sow-ells upfront that although there are cases in which the cochlear implant procedure does not work, he was 95 percent sure that the proce-dure was going to work.

On December 21, 2009, exactly one year to the day after his official deaf diag-nosis, Slayden’s cochlear implants were activated. The Sowells videotaped the activation.

“I was holding him and the first words I said were, ‘Hey Slayden, Mommy loves you!’ I literally had chills when Dr. (Laura) Mutchler said, ‘Okay, he can hear you.’” Alexis said. “Of course, he couldn’t say anything, he was just like a newborn baby. A whole new world of sound was just opened up to him. After a year of silence, my child could hear! He can actually hear better than people with normal hearing. It was a great Christmas gift.”

These days, Slayden, who has now been hearing for a

year and a half, and there-fore speaks like an eighteen month old with regular hear-ing would, is always making noises or talking. According to Alexis, Slayden’s older brothers get to see firsthand the ways that all children are different.

“They don’t see Slayden as a little boy with hearing aids. They see him as a wild little brother who is normal and will not ever hush. Sim-mons, our oldest son, asked me the other day, ‘Can we take Slayden’s ears off so he will be quiet?’,” Alexis said. “Isn’t that so funny? Two years ago, we would have done anything to hear his voice, and now we can’t get him to hush.”

“The most positive aspect (of the story), is that Slayden is a happy little boy who runs from me in the morn-ings when I put his ears on, and says Momma, Dada, Bubba, Bottle, Ball and ev-erything that a normal baby that has been hearing for a year and a half might say.”

When Slayden doesn’t want to hear something, he literally doesn’t have to hear it. He actually has the ability to turn his hearing off.

“If he gets mad or doesn’t get his way, his processors (the ear pieces) come fly-ing across the room. Anyone that truly knows Slayden has seen him throw them. He has the power to turn off his hearing. When his proces-sors come off, he can’t hear anything.”

Although he is adjusting to being able to hear really well, there are some sounds that are taking Slayden a lit-tle longer to get used to than others.

“Before we had the sur-gery, he would get on the vacuum cleaner and ride on it and wouldn’t get off. We hated vacuuming when he was awake. Now when you

cut it on, he runs in the op-posite direction. When we were cutting grass he used to chase the lawn mower be-cause he wanted to ride on it, and yesterday when we cut it on he came running as fast as he could into the house.”

Although Slayden has come so far, Alexis stays mindful that his situation will be an ongoing process.

“I know that this road is nowhere near being com-pleted with Slayden. We have to work hard on talk-ing and listening, as well as wear his “magic ears” on a daily basis, and it is hard keeping them on his ears, especially when he throws them all the time when he gets mad. But the sad part

is behind us. Our only tears from this point forward are tears from laughter over the things he does or says to communicate with us. He still points a lot. He says a

bunch of stuff where we have no idea what he is say-ing, and he throws his arms up at us like, ‘What’s wrong with y’all? Can’t you hear me?’”

Alexis says that she and her family have been amazed at the support that Slayden and their family have received from people within the community.

Alexis says the staff where she teaches at Stray-horn Elementary got to-gether and gave Slayden a musical snow globe and a musical picture frame for his first Christmas with hearing.

“I called my mom the minute I left school that day and we both cried tears of excitement and joy. I will never ever forget that feel-

ing. We had great family support, close friends, my teaching peers and caring principals and Scott had a lot of support from his work in Hernando.”

On another occasion, the Sowells were in a local res-taurant and a lady couldn’t keep herself from coming in to see Slayden and to check out his “magic ears”, as the family calls them. Alexis also says that they can’t go into Wal-Mart without someone stopping and ask-ing about them.

“We think it’s cool. We’re proud of it,” Alexis said.

All of Slayden’s brother’s teammates on his baseball team do their part in helping out as well. They all know

how to work his ears, so if they come out while he’s watching his brother play ball, one of them will put it back on him.

“It’s sweet to see that no matter where we are, who-ever we’re close to, whether it’s friends or a baseball team, everybody has just pitched in and helped out with him.”

Alexis acknowledges that going through Slayden’s troubles alongside him has made her stronger as well. Slayden’s doctor has reached out to Alexis on more than one occasion since his sur-gery to have her speak with the parents of other children who are having the same struggle that Slayden had.

“I occasionally talk to moms who are in the begin-ning stages of dealing with the acceptance and grief of discovering that their baby has hearing loss. I try to let them know what to expect and that there is a light at the end of the tunnel.”

The advice that she has for the parents of a disabled child is threefold.

“First of all, don’t look at your child as a disabled child. I know that according to medical terminology, my child is disabled, but if you look at a child and think that they will not succeed in life because of a disability, odds are, they won’t.”

“Second of all, know that there is a purpose. After the first year and a half of ups and downs, we now have peace about Slayden be-ing deaf. I know that there is a purpose for his hearing impairment even if I don’t know exactly what it is yet. It may be for our other two boys (Sanders and Sim-mons) to grow up and be-come audiologists, maybe for me to be an advocate for hearing impaired children, or maybe for Slayden to go on and do magnificent things in the future and to tell his story. I don’t know, but I have faith that God planned this for some reason.”

“Lastly, be proud of your child. We are so proud to be Slayden’s parents! We wouldn’t change one thing about him even if we could restore his hearing to that of a normal child’s! Show off those hearing aids. Show off those wheel chairs. Show off those glasses. Whatever the disability is, don’t look at it as a disability. Turn it into something positive. Sur-round yourself with support-ing family and friends who love and cherish your child just as you do. We couldn’t have made it without our family. (Slayden’s grand-parents) contributed a lot of time and sacrifice to help get Slayden to his doctor ap-pointments before and after his surgery.”

Along with the support of family, friends and the people in the community, Alexis has also clung to her faith when facing the differ-ent obstacles.

“When you have so many people that care and pray for your little one, how could those ears not work? I mean seriously, why would God lead us down this road just for a dead end? I always told myself, ‘If God brings you to it, He’ll get you through it.’ I just had to say to myself, ‘God will get us through it.’ And someway and somehow, we were able to get through it.”

Slayden Sowell is just like any other child. He loves playing with his toys, preferably his toy animals, and enjoys watching the Disney channel on televi-sion. But though Slayden is only two and a half years old, he already has a remark-able story. Though Slayden was born deaf, he now can hear.

Slayden’s journey to hearingTheron FlyRepoRteR

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Staff photo/Theron FlySlayden and his mother, Alexis Sowell.

Staff photo/Theron FlySlayden Sowell

Photo submittedHere you can see the magnets on the back of Slayden’s head which stimulate sound.