Yesterday, after the dentist appointment, I took Max to have his hearing tested. He is a slow speaker, and we are beginning the process of getting him some help. The first place to start is the audiologist to make sure he can hear correctly.
They looked in his ears, checked for fluid, asked some questions and then led us into a small, enclosed booth with a chair in the middle of the room facing the corner with a small table and a little stuffed bunny holding brass symbols.
“Oh cuuuu”, said Max, which means, “Oh, cute” in Maxinese.
In the two other corners, on either side of the chair, were two large speakers. Max sat on my lap, and the audiologist, on the other side of the wall made sounds in the left speaker, then the right, and back and forth to see if Max would respond. The volume levels got lower and lower to see if he would still respond and he did. He started anticipating where the sound would come near the end, when the volume was down to a low, raspy whisper.
Suddenly, the bunny with the symbols, who had no previous part in the test, suddenly lit up and started playing the symbols. Max jolted in my lap and the bunny, staring at us, played a creepy little song and bashed his symbols.
I’m really glad Max can’t speak yet, because I know exactly what he would have said:
“WHAT THE HELL?”
