About Me

My name is Tracy and I am married to an amazing man, his name is Thomas! We are a busy family that is always on the go between church, school, work and sports.... we are not a sitting around kind of family. We have 4 amazing children and are working on bringing home Elias to make 5. My hubby is Deaf and I am a sign language interpreter,we are very involved in the Deaf community and are excited to be adding another Deaf member to our family. Our kids, Aaron-19, Luke-11, Tommy-10 and Paige-5 are anxious for their new brother to be home. This is our second adoption and we are learning more everyday to lean on God, this journey is already strengthening our faith! We are working on learning how to turn everything over to God and know that He has a perfect plan and all will happen in His time! Good things come to those who wait.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

ENT and A hearing test in one day!

More and more doctors appointments are coming and going. Luke went back to Dupont yesterday to see the ENT and an Audiologist.  Luke has had many severe nose bleeds since we have been home. My upstairs is starting to look like a murder scene and Thank you to a good friend who gave me a secret way to get a TON of blood out of our cream colored upstairs carpets.  I put a humidifier in Lukes room as he seems to be stuggling to adjust to our heating system here and that helped for quite awhile and we had a week of no nose bleeds and then they came back with a vengance. Let me tell you it is scary to wake up with someone leaning over your face while you are sleeping and blood dripping all over your face while you sleep, scared me to death! Poor Luke he is just seeming to get used to them, but dont know if that is a good thing or not.

So off to the doctors we went.  The ENT said Luke has MANY little blood vessels that are crazy close to the surface and look very agitated. He is pretty sure it is from the changes in his environement, having spent 10 years of his life in a buidling with not much in the way of heat and maybe some allergies as well but that is hard to say at this point. So we are keeping with the humidifier and he gave us an antibiotic ointment for Lukes nose and hopefully that will help. We will go back in a few months when we stop using the heater and the weather changes and becomes more humid (this is NJ after all and we have plenty of summer humidity).

After that we hit the Audiologist for Lukes hearing test. Luke is so darn cute ,but he gets soooooo nervous when we go to the doctors that my heart breaks for him. He was so afraid he wouldnt "do good" on his hearing test and we would be mad at him or send him back to China. That breaks my heart that he even would think that. I told him we dont care if you hear anything or hear everything we love you for who you are and we think you are perfect the way God made you!  That said he decided it was safe to get his hearing tested. He had 3 different kinds of hearing tests done yesterday and they all showed what my husband and I knew already, the boy hears nothing. No matter what the frequency or Decibel level he has no response. I knew that already from his lack of reactions to any sounds at all..... and my hubby, his daddy doesnt hear much (well almost nothing) but my husband can hear our HUGE German Shepard bark when he is in the same room with him and Luke doesnt hear that so I suspected that he didnt have any hearing at all.  The Audiologist asked if we wanted him sent for an MRI and we said no, we are happy with the results of the hearing test. We really just needed it for the school as we dont care what his hearing loss is. Luke says "So can I hear?" I said what do you think? He said "Nope I am Deaf, just like my dad!" With that he gave the biggest smile ever! I told him that is right you are Deaf just like your daddy and God made you both PERFECT!   So we are done with the Audiologist, told them no further tests until our school demands a new audiogram down the road (and they will) other then that we are done with Audiology, no hearing aids, no cochlear nothing, just a beautiful boy that God made perfect the way he is and we dont want to change a thing about him.

School update. Luke is doing amazing in school! He is picking up things so fast it is crazy! He was funny on Monday when he came home with his first ever Library books, he was so proud of his books and couldnt wait to show them to me! Ofcourse the one is about DOGS heheh Luke is a crazy animal lover, he lives to talk about animals (one reason why him and Paige hit it off so well as she is OBSESSED with Animals and now her new brother is too!) and the other book was how to draw animals. We found out while visiting Lukes school that he has some really good artistic talent that we knew nothing about. The boy can draw! But funny thing is he does best when he has a picture to look at, not so good when drawing from his own mind.  But he has a hidden talent! I am wondering how many more hidden talents and abilities he has. It is truly amazing to watch the many layers of Luke open up and see what else he has hidden inside.

Lukes Language is skyrocketing! We can have all kinds of great converstasions now and I am starting to be able to explain many abstract ideas to him now too, although some are just to hard to explain still, he surely is progressing gorgeously and his ASL (American Sign Language) is so amazing to see! The boy is a natural signer! He signs like he has been doing it for years, not just less then 2 months! 

Oh FYI Luke is starting to play with Tommys friends now when they come over, we have discoverd Luke is in Love with our trampoline! The boy cant get enough of jumping around like a crazy man on there, he is hysterical to watch! Now he will go on there with Tommy and a few friends and they will play for hours and jump and laugh and of course since they are boys,tackle each other heheh.  Luke is funny for if one of Tommys friends tackles tommy Luke will run over and be Tommys protector and tackle them back. (ofcourse they are just playing and Tommy is a football player and a wrestler so it is all about contact sports in my house) Tommy thinks it is amazing that Luke wants to protect him and it makes me cry when I look out at the window and see Luke jumping on the trampoline with Tommy, Paige and 2 of Tommys friends and Luke is laughing so hard and playing so hard and you can clearly see he is having the time of his life. I cry not out of sadness, but out of Joy for knowing that Lukes horrible past of neglect, suffering and the feeling of being all alone in the world are over. Luke is so full of joy and laughter and never ending smiles that it is obvious to us that he feels safe and happy here. If we even mention China he gets terribly upset and tells me that China is over and he will never go back! He signs "me, you, daddy, Aaron, Tommy and paige are family forever"  Yup he is right, we are family forever and I Praise God for saving this precious little boy for our family, for knowing that he was perfect for us and that we are perfect for him! Thank you God for blessing us so!!!!!!!

Luke showing the boys his famous "take down" that Tommy taught him for wrestling!

                                                     I love watching them play together!

Trying to add more photos but they are onmy iphone and for some reason wont save to my computer... I am working on it!

5 comments:

Sue said...

Tracey, I am so glad things are going so well with Luke. It amazes how much our children can learn. Monika suffers from nose bleeds, I don't think as bad as Luke. We ended up buying some baby "burping" towels and keep one in her bed (under her pillow), if she gets a bloody nose, she will use that and then come and get us, so that way it doesn't bleed all over. The towel is now called the "nose" blanket, she (and now her sisters) will use it at night if they have running noses, I throw it in the laundry the next day. Less mess

Aus said...

Great, great, great! And thanks for having the hutzpah to simply sign off on more testing....I mean - what does it matter anyway?

Super happy for you guys - hugs - aus and co.

JulieM said...

So glad to hear Luke is still doing so amazing! It is so amazing to see God's plan unfold for sweet Luke and how he fits so perfectly in your family. Max had nose bleeds too which freeked us out bc it was days after he was in the hospital for an infection. Poor little guys has been hit hard by US germs. Back in to day high temp, throwing up, cough ... it is an ear infection :(!
Say Hi to everyone!
Blessings
Julie

Anonymous said...

THANK YOU for answering God's call to add this amazing young man to your family! Definately a GOD thing!

Linette said...

I love how thrilled he is to be like his daddy! You all are such a perfect fit for each other!

Our little boy!

Our little boy!
Opening up my care package from my family!

Curious what he is thinking!

Curious what he is thinking!
Checking out my Family for the 1st time ever! (this pic is of my new Brothers and Sister!)

His first reaction after seeing us

His first reaction after seeing us
This is my Forever Family!

Some goodies from the care package

Some goodies from the care package
Some of my new books

This picture makes me cry every time I see it!

This picture makes me cry every time I see it!
My 1st picture of my mommy and daddy! They say I love to look at my pictures again and again!

Studying our faces....

Studying our faces....
Checking out my new family again!

Look at that face!

Look at that face!
Checking out my new books

Aaron's Graduation

Aaron's Graduation
We are so Proud!

Xin Hai's name in Chinese!

福新

Fu XinHai

Xin Hai

Xin Hai
Isnt he the cutest ever?

Aaron's Senior Prom

Aaron's Senior Prom
My handsome Son, Aaron

Aarons prom

Aarons prom
Paige, Aaron and Tommy

My Family

My Family
The Worrell Family

Our Precious one

Our Precious one
Xin Hai in 2008 - so precious! Love that smile!

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