Already, Oliver has taken advantage of the safety of hearing. You'd think this would come later! Of course, Elliot uses it all the time-- he routinely crosses the street and plays in the neighborhood, on the alley, etc. All the boys do in our neighborhood, and he freely roams about. Now with bilaterals, I know we are in a much better situation for that. He comes straight home and knows to be more careful if one side is out of batteries. There are multiple benefits to hearing in a hearing world, but this is just one of them.

We have baby gates all over the house, but so far we have not used the ones which prevent him from getting to the area to go UPstairs, only the ones that are drilled in at the top of the stairs. He would only sit on the bottom step, usually. Any time at a playground he had been unsuccessful climbing stairs because he tries to scoot up them-- feet first (because he scoots rather than crawls due to vestibular problems). Doesn't work! Last week at a playland he figured out that head first is better. The next day, I heard his little voice saying "uh, uh, uh." After about 10 of these I ran like lightning from the kitchen to find him 3/4 of the way up the flight of stairs. Ours are wood, with wood floor at the bottom, so I was glad to have discovered his first foray into height! Thankfully he was talking his way up the stairs, which alerted me to his antics. We always say "up the stairs, up, up, up" or something of that sort as we climb the stairs.

He laughed and laughed when he saw me-- he knew it was quite an accomplishment! So, verbal language saved the day, and all is well. The gates go up around the base of the stairs now, and we practice climbing on safer stuff.