Marie-Josée Taillefer and René Simard
Family First
Marie-Josée Taillefer and René Simard’s children are both deaf, so the family has seen a lot of healthcare professionals over the years. The couple has agreed to talk to us about their journey and experiences. How did you find out about your children’s deafness? René: For Olivier, I started to wonder when he was around 5 months old. I realized I couldn’t comfort him with the sound of my voice. If I went to check on him in the middle of the night but didn’t turn on the light, he wouldn’t calm down from my voice alone. I’m fairly anxious by nature and I felt like something wasn’t right, but
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I didn’t want to worry Marie-Josée by saying anything. Eventually, we did go to the Sainte-Justine Hospital for testing, and that’s when we learned he was profoundly deaf. As for Rosalie, she was diagnosed at birth. Marie-Josée: I would add that when Olivier was 6 months old, he had a regular well-baby checkup. The doctor checked his ears and everything seemed fine. There was nothing
special to report. However, we still had some doubts, so we started doing tests at home. We’d drop things on the ground or stomp around to see if he could hear us. Problem was, sometimes he’d react, sometimes he wouldn’t. Either he was feeling the vibrations or it was just pure chance. Deafness can be really hard to detect. Olivier he’s profoundly deaf and it still took us several months to figure it out. Imagine what it’s like with milder hearing loss.
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