To hear, or not to hear........

One thing about having a deaf child that we realized from the very begining of our adventure, is deciphering what your child heard and what they did not hear can be a challenge.

Chance hears most of what goes on around him but we harbor no illusions that he hears everything. There are times when he does not hear us, that is to be expected. The interesting part comes when we try to find fact from fiction.

Chance's siblings will claim not to hear us sometimes when they are playing outside and don't want to come in yet. "I didn't hear you!" They will lament when we give them repercussions for coming in late for dinner. Sure, they don't hear us all of the time even with their perfectly functioning ears, but sometimes as a parent you just know that you are being had.

When it comes to Chance, it gets harder. "I didn't hear you." could very well be the truth. Or, it could be that he was having so much fun building the snow fort that he didn't want to come right when we called.

How is a parent to know for sure?

Maybe years down the road at some family function, our kids will have "confessionals" about things they did that we did not know about when they were young. Little inside stories they will have about the times they duped us or got away with things.

I personally had confessionals of deeds done in childhood with my siblings while my parents interjected with things like, "You WHAT?" or "Where did you do this?"
Like the times we jumped off of grandma's old shed into the snow drifts. Dangerous, spangerous......it was well worth the risk.

Perhaps someday Chance will clarify for us times when he pretended not to hear us. Most of the time, Chance seems very sincere in his claims that he does not know because he did not hear us. Chance's face is so expressive, that you can tell a lot from just looking at him, For now, we just have to take his word for it sometimes. In this regard, Chance does have it easier than his siblings. We are much more doubtful of his siblings claims of hearing loss.