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Welcome back to the All About Audiology podcast. I’m your host, Dr. Lilach Saperstein. I’m so excited to be having a very, very special guest today.

Dr. Saperstein: “Why don’t you introduce yourself? Welcome to the show!”

Ra’ananit: “I’m a little shy.”

LS: “You’re a little shy. That’s okay.”

Ra’ananit: “My name is Ra’ananit.”

LS: “How old are you?”

R: “Six.”

LS: “And how do you know me?”

R: “Because you’re my mommy.”

LS: “Oh, hello there. Welcome to my delightful, six year old, delicious daughter, who wanted to be on the podcast. Because what do you see me doing all the time?”

R: “Hmmm.”

LS: “Recording.”

R: “Yeah.”

LS: “Editing.”

R: “Your podcast.”

LS: “Yeah. Now the reason I wanted to bring you on here today is because you were not in school for a little while, right? How come you had such a long vacation when you were home with Ima (Hebrew for mother)?

R: “Because of Corona.”

LS: “Because of Corona, that’s right. We were home from march 15th all the way through the end of May and then school started up again. And then what happened?”

R: “A boy from my school’s Abba (Hebrew for father) came to, um, take pictures early of his son, and he went in with no mask, is my guess. And if he got Corona from his dad, that’s why I’m home right now.”

LS: “So, one of the fathers in your class tested positive for Corona. Because he dropped off his son and he was in school, then now the school is closed until they can test the children of the family and then they will decide if the school can open again. That’s why we are home and we decided to do a podcast. So, here we go.

I have some questions for you. What do you think is the coolest thing about ears?”

R: “That they can hear.”

LS: “How do they work?”

R: “First, when you hear a song, it hits your eardrum and then you get um, three, three bones, I forgot what they’re called. And if it’s too loud, they have to make it softer and if it’s too soft, they have to make it louder. What I remember that’s next is, um, lots of hair and when the hair hears something, they like change color and are like weee, back dancing. The signal that goes to the brain and then the brain helps you hear.”

LS: “Wow, you really know a lot about ears. So, let me ask you something. Do you think it’s really important to study together with other kids in your class or do you just like want one on one with Ima at home, or both?”

R: “Ummm, I don’t get it.”

LS: “Like, what’s better? Being in class with all your friends and learning together as a group? Or is better to just learn by yourself?”

R: “Both.”

LS: “Tell me why.”

R: “Because sometimes it’s better on my own because, because when I’m with only one person and I’m the only one learning, then no one has to bother. But when I’m at gan (kindergarten), it’s a little fun because, like, when she asks a question, then I know what she’s saying because I’m listening to other kids answer.”

LS: “Ah ha, when you listen to other kids answer, that helps you learn. I love that. So, you know a lot of people have been at home, on lock down, at stay at home orders all over the whole world. Do you know the word pandemic? Did you hear that word?”

R: “No.”

LS: “A pandemic means there is a sickness that’s going all around the world. What’s the name of that sickness right now?”

R: “Corona.”

LS: “Yeah, that’s the virus that’s going all over and a lot of people are getting sick. So, that’s why they closed down stores, and closed down a lot of things so that we shouldn’t make more people sick. But that means that a lot of students are home by themselves and not going to class. So, it’s a little bit hard to study only by yourself.”

R: “But what about a Zoom call with your teacher?”

LS: “Ah, what about a Zoom call with your teacher?”

R: “Well, actually I don’t like them.”

LS: “Okay, why not?”

R: “Because, or only the Morah (Hebrew for teacher) is talking or like the whole class is talking.”

LS: “So, it’s kind of noisy and hard to listen.

Well, what about when you have a teacher who puts everybody on mute? And when she’s talking, only you can hear the teacher.”

R: “Yes.”

LS: “And then when anybody wants to talk, they could un-mute.”

R: “Everyone.”

LS: “No, they could just un-mute one at a time.

That’s why I think those Zoom calls weren’t so successful because everyone was un-muted and it was just a big mess.

Well, what if we had an audiology class where students all over the world can come and share cases and ask questions? What do you think about that?”

R: “Sounds cool.”

LS: “Yeah, I think it sounds cool and we’re gonna be doing it the first Wednesday of every month. We’re gonna have open office hours for all International Audiology and Communication Disorder students that can come and join me on a Zoom call. Isn’t that exciting?!

Now, I’m requesting that the students who join will please join and become members. It’s $15 a month as patreons on the new patreons page. But any student who wants to come is absolutely welcome to join because I want this to be accessible. For those of you who it’s not available for you to pay, you can come anyway. Because I was talking to a lot of students and not everybody has money for this right now but I think it can be really valuable. And then other people who would be interested in sponsoring a student to join, they can do that by becoming patreons.”

[Little noises from Ra’ananit]

What are you doing with your mouth?! Haha. (Gives her daughter a kiss)

Do you know that I love you so much?”

R: “Yes.”

LS: “Yeah, you’re wonderful.”

R: “Because, you told me like a million times.”

LS: “I do tell you that a million times because I want you to remember it and believe it all the time. So, what do you want to tell the listeners?”

R: “It was fun being on mommy’s podcast.”

LS: “Thank you for coming on my show. You’re the best. (Big kiss) See, I told you again, hehehe.”

Allright, okay. That’s how you work from home and love having your children around for the moments that we choose to record and edit.

I wanted to come on here and first of all remind you that this is an All About YOU! episode. All About YOU! episodes are built in from the very beginning of the show to be able to have comments and questions and your reactions to what’s happening in the episodes, the podcast episodes, the interviews that I have.

In the previous episode, we heard the story that Madeline shared with us of her son, Kimball and their journey to getting their hearing loss diagnosis on top of other medical complications and medical issues that they had known about. And then hearing this on top of that, how devastating and difficult it was to receive that news. And also, how far they have come as a family in just two years and that’s a big, big message that I want to come from the show and from bringing people to share their experiences. To show you that things can change very quickly and although the feelings in the moment feel like forever and dreadful and overwhelming and scary, you are also really strong and there are tools and guidance out there for how to navigate this and how to make decisions for your child. You can listen to my conversation with Madeline Cheney from the Real Life podcast. That was episode 41, the previous episode to this one.

Next episode is going to be episode 43, and that’s going to be how to build a vision for your child’s life. I have disability advocate, Genia Stephen from The Good Things In Life podcast joining us. Our conversation was so powerful. She brought a lot of concepts, explained how they can apply to making a vision of what are the good things in life for our children and how can we really support them and support entire families. Keep an eye out for that podcast coming up next.

If you are listening to this show, there’s a good chance that you are doing that work. You are trying very hard to create a life, for your family and for your child to have as much success as they can, no matter where you are on this journey. And for those professionals and students who are listening, it’s so important for us to have this conversation together with families that this All About Audiology community is really opening the dialogue for all of us to know what are the needs of the families that we are trying to serve. And for families to share with us their experiences.

And I get the most loving, heart-felt appreciated messages from students who tell me that they are interested in audiology or that they are studying audiology and find real value in these kind of conversations outside of just the studies and the technical and clinical applications of everything that they learn. There really is a very strong heart-centered, person-centered, family-centered approach here on the podcast.

And I’ve been in touch with many of you amazing students over on Instagram. You’ve asked questions and I said, “You all have such great questions. I wish you could all just be in the same room together, even though some students are writing in from India and some from Belgium and plenty all over the US and Canada and also the UK and in Nigeria, all over the world. It’s amazing how much of a global community we have. If that pandemic has not shown us that, then we already have to know that by now.

So, we are going to be having International Student Office Hours with me, every first Wednesday of the month. July 1st, 2020 is when we are starting that. So, what I’m requesting is that students can sign up for the monthly membership and become a patreon of the podcast for $15 a month. Again, like I said, if you are not able to do it, I completely understand. There’s gonna be a scholarship that I’m going to be able to just make sure that everyone who joins the link is really a student and you can send your questions in. If you would like to join, please become a member. Or send me a DM to find out more about joining on scholarship.

I’m really excited because you also get to meet each other and have this incredible network of students all over the world. You can learn how audiology is happening in different places and what are the studies like and really get an understanding of the goals of being an audiologist, tips for getting through graduate school and also to share some incredible patient stories because we all have them.

This show has never had ads. I do not take sponsorships. This is all completely self-funded and it does come with costs like web hosting and podcast hosting and podcast editing and transcribing so that every episode has a full transcript. All of these things cost money. And as much as it is an incredible labor of love, I have been toying with the idea of creating a patreon for a while for listeners who appreciate the show to come and help support the show.

So, what I have done is I’ve created a patreon account. Patreon is a platform where you can support the show, support creators that you believe in the mission of what they’re creating. So, I have different tiers on there. For $5 a month, it would be so incredible for you to help out with the costs of the show, if you have gotten anything out of the show. I mean, it would be so helpful. I always listen to other podcasts and people talk about this. It’s so hard to ask. It’s so hard to say, if you’ve gotten something out of this, please consider supporting the show and kind of sponsoring the listenership for others. If you are in a position to do that, that would be really appreciated. It’s really hard to talk about this because it really is so much from my heart.

And then for the students, I do request you join that membership. Because this new office hours endeavor is also going to be taking from time and to set it up and everything and then have access to work with me. I mentor people privately so I think a $15 membership will be quite fair. But again, anyone who wants to join, please just send me a DM and I’ll put you through my scholarship process so that you can join and become also a member.

I’ve also created another tier, which I know that for many parents, you’ve heard of the transformational work that I do with parents to help them process, to help them grieve, to learn what all these audiology terms mean and how am I going to do this. The doctor is talking to me and I have no idea what they’re saying. They are sending me the run around of all these doctors. Do we do a surgery? Do we do hearing aids? When you’re in that state of all the questions and we work together, I take you through my process of being able to then come into a place of confidence. I do know that working with me can be difficult for many families who are having financial struggles and it really means a lot to me that more families should feel that they are doing incredible and feel confident and be able to connect to your child and know that you are doing an amazing job at being their parent. Sometimes, you really have to talk through and learn some of those skills and get that support so I do work with families one on one.

Because I’m starting this patreon, I’m opening ten spots at a very discounted rate to be able to work with me by becoming a third-level patren for $75 a month. You’ll get monthly calls one on one with me, which is the cheapest way to work with me right now. So, I would really, really love for all of you, listeners of the podcast to go over to patreon.com/allaboutaudiology. There will be a link on the website, on Facebook and on Instagram for you to come and become a patron and show your support of the show so that I can continue making these. I really want to. I have incredible, incredible backlog of interviews with audiologists, with parents, with other professionals and a lot going on. Lots of big things.

So, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for being here and you can see that I had my sweet, sweet daughter with me. I have to be able to show her that when you have work that comes from your heart, it’s worth it and it’s something you have to do. I feel so compelled to be making this podcast and even though I’ve been doing it through having work and being a mom and all the things that I do, I really invest my time, my energy and my money into this podcast. I’m so grateful that you listen to the show, that you share the show and become a patreon of the show.

When you sign up, when you become a patreon, I will shout you out on Instagram. I will include your name in the thank you at the end of episodes and we are going to rock!!! Hahaha. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I’m Dr. Lilach Saperstein and this is the All About Audiology podcast.

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