Holden and the Sedated ABR

As many of you may know, our little Holden has a bit of a language/speech delay.  We are proactively working with a speech therapist to jump start his language development, but I realized that we hadn't had his hearing tested since he was born.

Trying to ensure that we were covering all bases, I took him over to the audiology department at Memorial Herman.  Holden underwent a standard hearing test, where he sat on my lap in a sound proof room, and his responses to different noises were tested.  The results were inconclusive, and the audiologist recommended a sedated hearing test, or a Sedated ABR.  

As many parents can imagine, the mention of any sort of sedation for my baby boy stirred up all sorts of anxiety, but after some contemplation I came to the realization that ruling out all factors was the best possible course of action in targeting his language development issues.

So about a month ago, Jordan and I took our very hungry and fussy two-year old to the Childrens Hospital in Katy.  Holden hadn't eaten or drank anything since the night before, and was understandably starving, but really overall, much better than I had expected.  We checked him in and dressed him in an adorable little hospital set of jammies.

Soon after, the nurse came in and prepared to administer the sedation liquid orally.  I wasn't very optimistic that he would swallow any of it.  According to the nurses, it was basically straight alcohol, and although they had never tried it, definitely knew that it didn't smell very appealing.  However, Holden must have been even thirstier than I thought because he sucked up almost every last drop of the medication.  Soon after, I could feel my rambunctious toddler turn into jello, but still he fought it.  Throwing himself all over the crib, wiggling in my arms, and smiling/giggling/grunting at random moments.  

After about 15 minutes, we realized he would need the second dose, making that the maximum amount allowable for his age and weight.  If this didn't take, we would have to start all over and bring him back to be put under by general anesthesia, which we wanted to avoid at all costs.  The nurse suggested maybe we were distracting to him, and suggested we leave the room for a bit.  Another 15 minutes later, and they were back to get us, telling us he was not yet asleep.  As we neared the room, I could tell by the screaming that he was exhausted and close to sleep.  I knew that if he saw us, and I held him, he would relax enough to fall asleep.  

Sure enough, after about 2 minutes of rocking, and swaying, Holden was out.  And once he finally closed his eyes, it seemed like there was nothing that could wake him.  

The audiologist administered the test, which basically evaluated his brains response to audio stimulus.  When it was over, she reaffirmed our beliefs that his hearing was totally normal, and we had nothing to worry about.  

We gently woke Holden up, and after he drank some water, and they made sure he was okay to go home, loaded him up in the van.  

What happened next was classic.

The doctors warned us that the effects of the medication would take about 4 hours to wear off.  Luckily, I was ready to document it all.