Can you hear me, Major Tom? Part II.

Well, that was one of the toughest and most stressful days I have put down in a considerable amount of time. Results-wise, it went fine, it wasn't spectacular but it wasn't a disaster, more of which in a while but it transpires that Noah's right ear is perfect whilst the left-most fella is not quite breaking any hearing records but has some definite levels of hearing and nothing to raise any alarm bells. The slight discrepancy between arising from a suspicion of congestion based fluid in some part of his ear system (the science escapes me). Everything aside from the result though, was an unmitigated stress-fest.

From the time we arrived in the hospital to the time we finally departed was a cool six hours. Upon arrival we bumped into some friends we had met at St.Michaels House as they were in for their little chap's heart operation, we haven't heard how they got on and so we are wishing all the best to little James and we hope everything went well. We made our way to the appointment area with the instructions ringing in our minds that Noah should be "sleepy but awake upon arrival". Now, in my admittedly limited experience as a Daddy, I have seen two distinct phases of Noah alertness, wide-awake and fast asleep. This concept of "sleepy but awake" was a new one on me and so with some trepidation we checked ourselves in. The doctor came out to us in the corridor to assess Noah's sleepiness levels and basically prep him for the test which involved a sticker on his forehead and one behind each ear (see images at the bottom of this post for examples). Essentially, when the test was ready to begin, we were to snap our fingers and he was to drift unassailably off to sleep for the duration of the test without stirring once. As the mockneys from my area would say, "you're 'avin a giraffe ain't ya?". What happened in practice was that after some serious walking up and down the halls with accompanied giggling and swooshing noises, an asleep Noah was bought in in my arms and was ready to be hooked up to the various computers and machines. As each crocodile clip was applied to his triumvirate of head stickers, he flinched aggressively and more worryingly, his one eye was starting to creep awake. Pretending I couldn't see this happening, I attempted to hold him in place whilst giant cotton buds were inserted into each ear and sounds waves sent down them. Net result was one awake baby right there in the sound proof room. A miserly attempt to get him back to sleep was as successful as a government budget policy and so we were sent back out with the instruction to return a couple of hours later. We were rapidly realising that the odds were heavily against us and if he didn't sleep through the next attempt, we would have to leave and come back another day. Now, when you have specifically taken a sparse holiday day off work to get this done, the prospect of having to come back, circumnavigate Crumlin for a parking space and do it all over again, was about as appealing as the food choices on that I'm a Celebrity nonsense blah blah whatever...

It was midday and we were faced with returning at 3pm with an asleep Noah. Ok, battle stations. If we could keep him awake, we reasoned, for 2 and a half hours we should be fine and given his fondness for wide-eyed awakery this should be a relative breeze. Ah, but he needs to be fed. Ok so, give him the bottle but keep him entertained whilst he chugs it down. Bottle finished and he's still awake, good good. Back to the waiting room to sing songs and generally stimulate him enough to distract him from the looming tiredness that was rolling its way towards him. It's now 1:30pm and we are again pretending that we can't see his eyes starting to hang heavy, the wheels on the bus were going round again as was the boat being row rowed gently down the stream. At 1:45pm we are consigned to the fact that we would have to spend a second day here as he finally beat off the wakey-wakeys and succumbed to the cuddly slumbers. A valiant effort from the young warrior but he just couldn't man the trenches any longer. As he snoozed soundly, we looked for the doctor to inform that we would come back another day.

A lifeline! The little twins who were booked in until 3pm could only half finish the test with one of them waking halfway through and refusing to return to the sleepy confines of the soundless room. Boo for them but a mighty hurrah for us if we acted quickly. Within a matter of seconds we had Noah back in the test room in his chair hooked up to the necessary and basically implied to the doctor it was now or never through a series of SAS-esque call signs and hand gestures. I watched the clock tick the seconds by and each audible click of the hand forced another bead of sweat to escape my brow and trickle painstakingly down the side of my face. Every movement by us seemed to be amplified tenfold and I recall the thumping heartbeats as the doctor tweaked and readjusted the inner ear buds and the various wires. Please don't wake up, please don't wake up, another five minutes down, please don't wake up, another...30 seconds are you joking? Please don't wake up., please don't wake up. Now, I have to hand it to Noah, when you gets into a sleep he certainly makes the most of it and his little snores pierced the silence of the room. After an undetermined amount of time and sweating, we got the thumbs up form the doctor that it was all over. Praise. The. Lord.

After the results summary and a referral to the Ear Nose and Throat department to check the congestion levels, we were free to go. I can understand the need for a child to be asleep during the test but seriously, whoever designed this test has clearly never come into contact with a child, maybe even another human as lets face it, who can honestly just drop off to sleep at the behest of a doctor in a strange room with a rather peculiar smell if we are being honest? If the test was conducted in your own home fair enough, but I just cannot see that it is feasible for this to work every time and surely there is a cost loss element here if doctors, equipment and space time is being used for unsuccessful testing? Maybe not I don't know, but it just seems a mad way of doing things if you ask me (which, I realise you are not but there you go).

So there you have it, our big day out at the hospital. I was sorely tempted to see if there were any spare beds going where we could grab a recovery lie down but if you are in any way aware of the available resources in the hospitals currently, you will appreciate the futility of such a request. We returned home thoroughly knackered to put it bluntly, reassured by Noah's ears but questioning our own sanity after the day we had put down. Hopefully now Noah's congestion is nothing too serious and nothing that a drop of snuffle babe won't sort out, it just mean's there will be another appointment on the horizon that will bring with it a new set of worries and concerns, likely high levels of hospital related stress and hopefully a healthy little boy on the other side. Nobody said it was going to be easy and for once, I am in agreement with the masses.