Early Child and Family Services

Our Case manager, Tobin, from ECFS came out last week. She works at Baxter School for the Deaf, and will be our contact for implementing and receiving services. She was really nice, and had a lot of information for us.

She basically told us about all the different options that were available to us, and that we were in charge of how often we wanted to receive them. I told her we wanted to be as proactive as possible, so would probably be taking advantage of everything they had to offer! There is a Parent/Infant program at Baxter twice a week in the fall that we will be attending. On tuesdays the babies (and Noah as well!) go downstairs to their preschool and hang out with some of the teachers. The parents go upstairs and have discussions on many different topics relating to hearing loss/education etc. Then on Thursdays there is a signing class for the Parents and their children. I'm really looking forward to it. I think it will be GREAT for both Lucas and Noah, and also for us because we will be able to meet and talk to families that are going through the same thing.

I also asked her about any ASL classes that the rest of our family could take. My parents and sisters, and most of the rest of my extended family have all expressed interest in learning to sign. I have to say that means SO SO much to us. Tobin told us that if we wanted, we could have someone come out to our house just to help us learn ASL, for anyone that wants to attend! I am so excited about that! That will be in the fall as well, because as they are a school, most people are off for the summer. I will definitely let everyone know once we start scheduling those sessions. We'll probably make it fun and have pizza parties or something on those nights as well!

She left us with a large three ring binder FULL of information about hearing loss and all that it entails. I've been reading it and have found it incredibly helpful. I'm really excited to get started with everything they offer us!