YORKTOWN, Va. - Everett Colley is almost 10 months old. He was born having total hearing loss in both ears. But thanks to a cochlear implant in his ear he received Monday, he’s able to take in the sounds of his first Christmas.
The Colley family says they love music and are excited that he can finally enjoy it along with his parents and siblings instead of having to feel the vibrations of the speaker.
Everett's parents, Ashley and Zachery Colley, say in addition to the implants, they are also learning sign language to help Everett. The implants should last him for the rest of his life.
"They do a newborn screening in the hospital before we leave, and he failed that," explained Ashley. "[It's] totally normal, common, so I didn’t think anything of it."
She says Everett has always been a little harder to soothe.
It was confirmed Everett had severe and profound hearing loss in both ears after an auditory brain response, or ABR, test.
"When she pulled her chair up and told us, I mean, it swung me off my feet. Because of COVID, he couldn’t be in the office, so he was in the car in the parking garage, and I just remember barely making it out of the hospital and looking at him and crying," Ashley told us.
At the couple's initial appointment, doctors asked them if they would potentially be interested in cochlear implants, which send sound directly to the nerve through the electrical pieces in the cochlea.
Ashley explained how Everett's brain has to relearn or learn new things.
"Because he can’t hear things, he shows them more. Like, he shows us his love and his happiness a lot more than our hearing children do. Not that they weren’t happy, but it’s just a different vibe with him," she said.
And even though they "thought negative things at first" having a baby who couldn't hear and the entire situation being foreign to them, the Colleys say Everett has been a blessing to them.
Related: Local baby gets her cochlear implants turned on, almost cries hearing mom’s voice
